


The Sea Captain's House - Part 8:  'A Week in the Life'

by Beautyinthemoonlight



Series: The Sea Captain's House [8]
Category: Women's Soccer RPF
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-17
Updated: 2018-05-27
Packaged: 2019-05-08 08:50:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 85,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14690637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beautyinthemoonlight/pseuds/Beautyinthemoonlight
Summary: This is a shorter installment from the series and it spans 9 consecutive days in January of 2029 for the Krieger family.  Each day is told from the point of view of one member of the family (and then  I included the two weekend days as a family view in one chapter).  The story picks up right where we left off and gives you a glimpse of what a day in the life of each member of the Krieger family looks like.  I've had a lot of requests for this and I hope you like it.  It was a fun change of pace.





	1. Drew

**Author's Note:**

> I'm baaaaaaaccckkk. ;)
> 
> There's a Tumblr Blog dedicated to this story if you want to check it out. Watch out for spoilers though if you're just starting this Series. Search 'beautyinthemoonlight1124' if you want to see pictures of characters, story elements, floor plans of the big old house and other buildings in the work, Family Tree charts, and other things.

“Let’s go Bud!” Ashlyn’s steady voice filled the quiet bedroom two seconds after she knocked quickly on Drew’s closed door and swung it open wide. “Time to get up.”

The keeper moved to both windows in the room and pulled up the roman shades, letting daylight stream in through the glass. Drew groaned and rolled over, away from the light.

“Already?” he whined.

“It’s almost 5 past 7” Ashlyn patted his butt affectionately, still under the covers, as she walked by his bed. “Hurry up. I already let you have 5 extra minutes. Don’t make me regret it.” She bent over three different times to pick up dirty clothes as she moved through the room. “And why am I picking up all these dirty clothes? If your 5-year old brother can get his clothes into the hamper why can’t you?” she asked rhetorically as she walked into the bathroom that Drew shared with Dodge. 

5-year old Dodge was standing in front of the toilet peeing and he turned his head to greet his mother.

“Hi Mama!” he grinned exuberantly.

“Hi again little man” Ashlyn couldn’t help but chuckle at her youngest son as she dropped Drew’s clothes into the hamper in the corner. “Watch what you’re doing now” she frowned quickly and then rolled her eyes as she saw Dodge’s stream veer off towards the side of the toilet as he waved to her. 

“Oops.”

“Make sure you wash your hands and then get your butt downstairs for breakfast.”

She put the lid back on the hamper and then crossed back through Drew’s bedroom to get to the door to the second-floor hallway. “Drew!” she yelled when there was still no movement from the 9-year old boy in the bed. “Get up! Now!”

“Ok, geez” Drew replied as he sat up and pushed the covers off of his body. “I’m up.”

Monday mornings were always the hardest, simply because the kids got out of practice on Saturday and Sunday. It didn’t take more than a day to throw them off their schedules, no matter how old they were or how long they’d been getting up at 7am to eat breakfast and start their school day. Ashlyn hesitated in the doorway for a few seconds, needing to see her eldest son’s bare feet actually hit the floor before she could trust that he wouldn’t lay back down again. Once he stood up and started pulling his pajamas back onto his body – he had started sleeping in just his tightie-whities the year before, he would get his pjs on after his nightly shower but then take them off before snuggling into bed for the night - she knew she could move on to wrangling another child.

“I want you sitting at the table eating breakfast in three minutes” she quirked her eyebrow at him expectantly, waiting for his acknowledgment before moving all the way into the hallway.

“Yeah, I know” he yawned as he shuffled towards the bathroom.

“Dodger’s in there, why don’t you use the one downstairs, ok?” she suggested with a smile, heart still melting at the sight of her first-born child.

“Why does he always get to use the bathroom first?” Drew frowned as he changed direction and moved towards his mama and the hallway. 

“Well, because he gets up before you do” Ashlyn tousled his thick, dark hair, bending over to give the top of his head a kiss as they both walked into the hall. 

It had always amused the keeper that Dodge was the early riser and morning person, like Ali was, and that Drew was the sleepy head who had trouble coming to life in the morning, like she herself was. DNA be damned. How the heck had that happened?

“Hurry up now” she winked at him and enjoyed the small smile he couldn’t keep off of his face from the affectionate touches. “Mom washed your favorite shirt for you last night so you could wear it today. Make sure you thank her.”

Drew had an oral book report on ‘The Swiss Family Robinson’ scheduled that day and he had been nervous about it all weekend. He had read the book and he had done the work. But the idea of standing in front of his classmates and talking about it, even with the cool poster Ashlyn had helped him make of the treehouse the Robinson family lived in, was not something he was looking forward to. Ali felt sorry for her shy boy so she made sure he could at least be comfortable in his favorite shirt. She knew he felt more confident wearing the long-sleeved t-shirt with the big picture of his favorite action hero from his favorite video game. Ashlyn had never even thought about that but it was one of the small ways that the brunette showed her family every single day how much she loved them.

“Lily, please eat your breakfast sweetheart” Ali urged from her monitoring place, standing behind the girl’s chair at the nook table. She nudged Lily’s plate closer to her and moved her stuffed animal from the table to the girl’s lap. “Come on, we’ve got 5 minutes before we have to go up and brush teeth and get dressed.” 

Ali quickly surveyed the rest of the table and was pleased to see that both Josie and Dodge had almost finished their bowls of cereal, as well as the half of banana that Ashlyn had split for them. Lily, after the redirection from her mommy, was heartily eating her strawberries dipped in Nutella and had even taken a slurp from the tube of squeezable yogurt as well. The brunette knew better than to make a big deal out of it but shared a surprised smile with her wife who sat across the table on the banquette seat between Drew and Dodge.

“Is your stomach bothering you honey?” Ali frowned sympathetically at Drew who had, as usual, touched very little of his food.

He had eaten a few spoonfuls of breakfast cereal and taken two bites of toast – plain white bread with nothing on it except butter, but that was it. Ashlyn hadn’t said a word to him about any of it because she knew he was nervous about his oral book report and was trying hard not to make his stressful morning worse for him. She looked to her right and saw Drew’s bottom lip start to quiver as his big brown eyes met Ali’s identical, concerned ones. He couldn’t speak without crying so he just nodded his head and looked down at his lap.

“Hey, you’re going to do great today” Ashlyn put her arm around the boy and pulled him into her side as he started to cry, burying his face in her chest to try and keep his siblings from seeing. She wrapped both arms around him and kissed the top of his head, holding him for a couple of minutes as the other kids stared. “It’s ok buddy” the keeper whispered into his dark hair.

“Alright guys, let’s finish eating now” Ali cleared her throat, addressing the three youngest kids and trying to steady herself as she felt her son’s emotional distress deep in her chest. “Two more minutes and we’ve gotta go upstairs.”

“I’m done Mommy” Josie replied quietly, not taking her eyes off of her big brother.

“Ok, good job Jose” Ali patted her on the shoulder. “Take your bowl to the sink, please.” The brunette waited a few seconds but none of the little kids moved. “Guys, listen” she moved to the end of the table so she was standing between Dodge and Lily instead of behind the two girls. “Drew’s nervous about his oral book report today, but he’s fine.” She smiled reassuringly when the twins looked up at her. “He’ll be ok. He just needs a few minutes. So let’s finish eating, put our dishes in the sink, and then go upstairs and get dressed.”

It was a little tighter schedule than usual, but by 8:15am Ali was backing the minivan out of the driveway with all four kids properly buckled into place with backpacks and lunches. Just as they got halfway backed out into the street, Ashlyn came flying out of the mudroom door with Drew’s poster in one hand and his trumpet and music folder in the other, trying to catch Ali’s attention.

“Oh my God, you’re my hero” Ali exhaled through the open window while Ashlyn handed the colorful poster to Drew through the sliding door and put his trumpet and music folder at his feet. “Thanks babe” Ali gave the keeper a quick peck on the lips before getting back to the task at hand. 

Neither mom had the heart to chastise Drew for leaving important things behind that morning. 

“See you at pick-up, guys!” Ashlyn yelled after them as the minivan finished backing out of the driveway.

Being a 4th grader was a pretty good gig at the East Gloucester Elementary School. The 4th graders had been in the same school since kindergarten so they were in their fifth, and penultimate year at EGE. Next year, as top dog 5th graders, they would truly be big men and women on campus. Drew wasn’t quite as cocky as the rest of the 4th graders, but he was pretty comfortable and confident in his daily school experience. He had lots of friends and joked and interacted with them easily throughout the day. He was an average kid who usually followed the rules, listened attentively, and did as he was told. But he liked to have fun with his friends and classmates and was a typical 9-year old boy who could be gross and annoying and disgusting at times. He and Ethan Machado were still best friends and they spent most of the day together because they were in the same class. There were about 260 students, in total, attending the elementary school and they were spread fairly evenly among the different grades. There were two classes in each grade with roughly 20-22 kids per class. Drew was smart, but not as smart as Josie. He was a good athlete with above-average coordination and speed, but he wasn’t the freak of nature athlete that Dodge was turning out to be. Drew was the oldest of the four young Krieger kids and his three younger siblings all looked up to and adored him. He was definitely the ringleader of the crew but he was a quiet leader. Make no mistake, he could be every inch of the obnoxious older brother, making any sibling’s life miserable just for the fun of it. But overall, Drew Krieger was a good kid who did his best to make his moms happy and proud.

The Elementary School day was broken up by year into three separate schedules. School started at 8:30am and finished at 2:30pm. The Kindergarteners and 1st Graders operated, roughly, on the same schedule. They shared the first lunch period of the day as well as two other recess/snack periods. The 2nd and 3rd Graders shared a slightly different schedule with the second lunch period of the day and two recess periods. The 4th and 5th Graders shared their own schedule with the third and final lunch period of the day and only one recess period. The curriculum varied from week to week as the school worked in music and art classes, a minimum of 3 a week, total. They also mixed up the order of the classes from day to day to keep things fresh for the students. The four subjects Drew was studying that year were Reading, Writing, Math, and Science and here’s what his schedule was for that Monday. His nerve-wracking oral book report was happening during his Reading class which was his second class of the day, just before lunch.

8:30 Class 1 – Science  
10:00  
10:05 recess  
10:20  
10:25 Class 2 – Reading  
11:45  
11:50 LUNCH (with 5th Graders)  
12:35  
12:40 Class 3 – Math  
1:35  
1:40 Class 4 – Writing  
2:25  
2:30 School Release

The big old house was 1.4 miles away from the East Gloucester Elementary school and fell just short of the 1.5 mile requirement that would have allowed the Krieger kids to ride the bus to school. If you lived 1.5 miles or more away from whatever town school you were attending, you could ride the bus. That’s why Ashlyn and Ali dropped off and picked up their kids every day. But the good news was that both the O’Malley Innovation Middle School and the Gloucester High School were far enough away so the Krieger kids could take the bus when they were old enough.

“How do you think he’s doing?” Ashlyn asked her wife through the phone at 10:30am. They both knew that his Reading Class had just begun and they were anxious as hell for him.

“I think it’s a miracle the nurse hasn’t called us yet” Ali exhaled nervously from her desk at work. “Did he eat anything this morning?”

“No, not even the peanut butter toast” the keeper answered from the desk in the home office above the garage, referencing the special breakfast she had made for him after the other kids had gone upstairs. “I did it the way your mom does it and everything, he just wasn’t hungry.”

“I think he is hungry but his stomach gets upset and he’s afraid he’ll have diarrhea at school. So he doesn’t eat and avoids the whole problem.”

“Except he doesn’t eat” Ashlyn sighed. “Poor kid. I can’t wait to meet with that specialist next week. I just wanna know what the hell is going on with him, once and for all. Then we can figure out how to handle it.”

“I know. It’s so fucking frustrating. I swear, if it wasn’t for Patty advocating for us so hard we’d be absolutely nowhere trying to figure this out.”

They were both quiet for almost a minute, deep in their own thoughts and worrying about Drew.

“I should let you get back to work I guess” Ashlyn finally offered, even though the last thing she wanted was to let her wife go.

“I can’t think about anything other than our sweet boy this morning” Ali’s voice was soft and fragile and the keeper had to push her thumb into her other ear so she could hear her. “It just kills me that he’s suffering like this. Both the nerves about his presentation and whatever the hell is going on with his stomach. I’d do anything to make either problem better.”

“You’d give your right arm to help any of the kids, baby. I know you would” Ashlyn tried to lift her wife’s spirits and calm her nerves. 

“We both would” Ali replied tenderly.

Picking up the kids was one of Ashlyn’s favorite things to do, once she allowed herself to let go of work obligations and enjoy it. It could be frustrating to drop everything, no matter how important it was whether it was for the Mental Health Initiative or Knight-Harris or The Academy or even something she was working on for one of her sponsorships. But before she had finished the 10-minute drive from the big old house to the elementary school, her head had always made the transition from professional working woman to mom. She loved it. The Kindergarten classes, both of them, got out of school first, at about 2:15pm. The idea was for them to get picked up and out of the way before the rest of the school released. Any kids who had older siblings that they would need to wait for were escorted to the playground when the weather was nice out or else they gathered in the gym instead. The 1st Graders got out at 2:25pm, followed by the other four grades at 2:30pm. The keeper spent 15 minutes playing basketball in the gym with Dodge, Lily and a few other kindergarteners. It was the first year that the twins were old enough to play youth basketball and they were both super excited to join their older brother and sister in the sport. Soccer was still the most popular sport in the big old house, but basketball was a close second. Ali was sure big sister Meg’s success in and passion for the sport was responsible and she loved it. Ashlyn was going to coach all three of the little kids’ teams, while still keeping up her assistant coaching duties for Drew and Ethan’s team. The first basketball practices were happening in the early evenings that week for Josie and Drew because they were older. But the first-year players didn’t practice until game-day. On game day they practiced for 30 minutes and then they played the game for the next 30 minutes and it was a system that had worked well over the years.

The keeper kept her eyes peeled for Drew as several of the older kids came into the gym to collect their younger siblings and walk them out to the bus or their parent’s car. Josie’s red head appeared and Ashlyn couldn’t help but smile at the genuine look of joy that was on her sweet face. That kid loved going to school and that’s all there was to it. Ms. Johnson, the twins’ kindergarten teacher who had taught all four of the Krieger kids in her class over the years, was politely ushering everybody out of the gym now that it was officially 2:32pm and all the students were finished for the day. Ashlyn herded her three youngest towards the door, still craning her neck for any sign of Drew.

“JoJo, did you see Drew?” she asked her daughter after hugging and kissing her hello.

“Umm, I saw him at recess” she scrunched up her face as she thought hard, “and then at the end of lunch.”

Well that was good, the keeper thought to herself. The three different lunch periods overlapped so Josie’s second and third grade lunch was just ending as Drew’s fourth and fifth grade lunch began. Ashlyn wanted to ask Josie if Drew had eaten his lunch but stopped herself. The redhead already had a tattling problem and both she and Ali tried hard not to encourage it. Before she could say anything else, Drew was standing in front of them with a goofy, relieved look on his face. It was a Friday kind of face, even though it was only Monday.

“Hey Big D!” she held out her hand for a high-five, still getting used to the fact that her 9-year old son didn’t always like to get hugged by his moms at school. “How did it go? Did you crush your oral book report or what?” she grinned and hoped more than anything that it had gone well.

“Yeah, it was ok” he shrugged but she could tell by the permanent smile on his face that it had been well-received. “I’m just glad it’s over” he rolled his eyes and let Ashlyn pull him into a quick hug to celebrate.

“That’s awesome Drew! Great job bud!” she enthused as they pulled apart again.

The five of them were slowly moving towards the front entrance of the school and Ashlyn did her daily survey of all of the crap they were supposed to have with them. She was relieved to see Drew carrying his trumpet case and music folder and pleased to find the correct backpack on everybody’s back.

“Does everybody have their water bottles? Anybody forgetting anything that we’ll need tonight or tomorrow morning?” she asked, raising her voice above the hubbub of the crowded corridor filled with students and parents and teachers.

“Yes, mama.”  
“No, mama.”  
“I have everything, mama.”

“Yes or no, which is it you two” she tapped the twins on their shoulders.

“Yes I have my water bottle” Lily clarified her answer.

“No I didn’t forget anything” Dodge did the same.

“What about you Drew, where’s your poster? Do you need to run back and get it?” she looked over her shoulder towards the hall that led to his classroom.

“No” he shook his head nonchalantly. “Mrs. Urban wanted to hang it up” he shrugged again and blushed a little.

“Wow” Ashlyn tried not to make a big deal out of it, but she knew that Mrs. Urban only hung up or kept projects that were top-notch. She was kind of old-fashioned and believed in rewarding excellence and extra-effort when any of her students dazzled her with their work. “That’s great Drew. I’m really proud of you” she squeezed his shoulder and caught just the corner of the grin on his face before he quickened his pace leading the clan out of the school.

Because Mondays were harder than any other day with the kids always seeming to get out of synch over the weekend, Ali had arranged the schedule so they weren’t racing off to any extracurricular events after school. She at least did her very best to keep the schedule light on Mondays. When Josie was involved in a play she would have rehearsal from 3-5pm, twice a week, at the school. And then the family group music lesson up in Rockport was typically on Tuesday afternoon from 3-4pm. Sports practices tended to be either from 5-6pm or 6-7pm depending on how many other obligations the coach of the team had (or how many other children of their own that they were responsible for coaching). It was pretty rare to have all four kids home in the afternoon and then again in the evening. And that wasn’t even taking into account social visits. Josie sometimes went to Kayla’s house or Kayla came to the big old house a couple of times a week too. And Drew did the same with Ethan. Dodge and Lily didn’t ask to go to friends’ houses very often and both Ali and Ashlyn thought, and hoped, it was because they were still young enough to want and need time at home with their own parents. They were still only 5 years old.

“Can I go to Ethan’s house, pleeeeeeease?” Drew asked in his most adorable voice and with his sweetest smile.

Ashlyn looked up as they walked down the front steps of the school and saw Ethan standing next to his father’s car, idling at the curb with Sam Machado at the wheel. The keeper considered the request and normally she would have said yes without much hesitation. But she was worried about Drew not eating much, if anything, all day. Plus, he had homework to do and in the back of her mind she knew Ali would be sad if he wasn’t home when she arrived after her long, anxious day of waiting for news about the boy and his oral book report. On the other hand, it was Monday and that was the day Josie’s piano teacher came to the house for her private lesson. Drew hated that and made a big deal out of how annoying he found the whole thing to be. Before the hour-long lesson was up, Drew had usually aggravated both of his moms so much that they talked privately about what the hell his problem was in the first place.

“Yes, but you have to be home for dinner...”

“Yes!, aw Mama, do I have to?” he was excited and then disappointed in a split second.

“Yes, you have to” Ashlyn gave her son a look telling him not to push his luck. “Your mom is going to want to hear about your day and your presentation...”

“But you can just tell her” he reasoned, turning to face her for the first time at the bottom of the steps and standing on his tiptoes in a true sign of eagerness. “Pleeeeaaase?” he clasped his hands together at his chest in a prayerful plea.

“You can go, but you’re eating dinner at home tonight Drew. Take it or leave it” she replied flatly.

“Fine” he kicked at the sidewalk and shrugged his shoulders with a heavy sigh.

“Or you can not go at all” she challenged, not liking his attitude. “You can come home now and get your homework done like the rest of us...”

“No, no, I’m sorry. Thank you Mama!” he changed his tune instantly and scampered over to Ethan who had a big grin on his face and waved at the Kriegers.

After quick hellos with Sam, a brief explanation about Drew’s not eating much all day, followed by Ashlyn telling Sam that she would pick Drew up at 5:15pm, the Kriegers headed home. Drew and Ethan spent the afternoon playing video games in Sam’s living room and eating the grilled cheese sandwiches the chef prepared because he knew fussy-eater Drew loved them. The boys got online with some other friends and strategized pretty well together, for 9-year old boys, while Sam busied himself in the kitchen taking care of restaurant business on his laptop. Lisa, the newest Mrs. Machado after their big wedding 7 months earlier, wouldn’t be home from work until almost 6pm so the boys often spent time this way. They were good boys and none of the four parents felt like they had to keep a constant eye on them. But they were at that age where young boys started having questions about things they saw or read. Neither Drew nor Ethan had started puberty yet and were still pretty innocent about anything having to do with sex and their bodies. But that didn’t stop them from ogling the scantily clad female figures in their video games and comic books and then joking about it because they didn’t know what else to do about the way it made them feel. They didn’t understand much yet but they were definitely starting to get more interested in the great mysteries of girls and sex.

When they were online playing video games with their friends they could use the video game console to access the YouTube app, among others like Netflix and Amazon TV. Most kids were experts at YouTube because they had grown up using it to learn how to play the video games they loved so much. Other times, for some inexplicable reason that made Ashlyn’s head almost spin right off of her body when she saw her kids doing it, they tuned in to YouTube and watched other kids unwrapping gifts or opening blind bags on camera. For hours. The keeper couldn’t imagine anything more ridiculous than watching some stranger unwrap a gift that you wouldn’t be able to touch or play with yourself. It just seemed mean. But the kids loved it! Ali had reminded her wife that if that’s the worst thing they found to watch on YouTube then she was all for it. But sometimes, when they had a little bit more privacy, like they did at Ethan’s much quieter house, the boys explored a little bit more on YouTube and found things they knew their parents wouldn’t let them watch. Sometimes it was a music video or just some previews for R-rated movies that someone had compiled and posted on YouTube. It’s not like they were watching porn or anything, but sometimes the things they found could be pretty risqué, bordering on downright raunchy. Somebody always put together videos of the sex scenes from different movies, for example. It was one of these videos Drew and Ethan were watching, heads both tilted to one side as they tried to understand what they were looking at on the big screen tv in front of them, when Sam surprised them from the hall behind them.

“You know, you shouldn’t assume the sex you see on these videos and in movies is what real sex is really like” Sam’s voice was even and steady as he walked to the back of the couch where the two boys both jumped a mile in the air. “Relax, you’re not in trouble” he put a hand on each boy’s shoulder to try and calm them down. “It’s normal for you guys to have questions about it. About girls and their bodies and sex. But these videos aren’t the place to get your answers. Do you understand that?”

Neither boy breathed a word as they sat stock still on the couch praying for Sam to go away. Sam had already had the sex talk with Ethan, an age-appropriate explanation of where babies came from and some gentle advice about the changes his own body would start to go through in another couple of years or so. Drew had also had all of those conversations with Ashlyn and Ali, along with a group sex talk that Dom Dwyer had given Noah Cross, Cassius Dwyer and Drew just that summer during the NH lake vacation. Dom was holding up his end of the bargain he had made with Ashlyn. He would help her boys through puberty and she would answer any LGBTQ questions for his kids. Neither Ali nor Ashlyn had considered Sam Machado for the job of sexual confidante for their son. They assumed it would be one of their brothers or maybe even their fathers or, more realistically, Dom or Ryan. But it made perfect sense that Sam would be involved. Drew and Ethan were always together at one house or the other and Sam was always the parent on duty during the week while Lisa was at work. 

“Hey Sam” Ali greeted easily when he opened the door for her at 5:15pm that evening. “Drew ready to go?”

“Um, yeah” Sam looked over his shoulder towards the living room where the boys were playing video games again. “Can we talk for a minute?” he asked quietly and nodded his head the other direction, towards the kitchen.

“Are you kidding me?" Ali’s eyes went wide after listening to Sam fill her in on the conversation he had finished with the boys thirty minutes earlier. “They’re 9” she gestured her surprise with her hands and then dropped them both to her sides again as she shook her head in disbelief. 

“I know, I know” Sam tried to reassure her. “Nobody was more surprised than me” he chuckled quietly and raised his eyebrows. “For what it’s worth, I really don’t think either one of them is interested in anything more than looking at some naked girls...”

“And this is supposed to make me feel better?” her voice was quiet but sharp and she put her hands on her hips, still dressed in her business suit, skirt and trench coat from work.

“Well, yeah” he shrugged, looking sheepish. “They’re boys Ali. Naked girls is pretty much all they’re going to be thinking about for the next...I don’t know, 15 years” he chuckled again and was relieved when he saw the brunette’s shoulders drop a little. “I just thought you should know. And I hope I handled it ok.”

“No, you’re right” she sighed and shook her head, trying to collect her racing thoughts. “I mean, I have no idea what boys think about but thank you for telling me, and you handled it great Sam. Really. Thank you.”

They smiled at each other and Ali opened her mouth to say something but changed her mind. They nodded at each other after a brief, awkward silence and Ali turned her head towards the front door and the living room just next to it.

“Drew, time to go buddy. Get your backpack. Don’t leave anything behind” she called out and then cocked her head to listen for the sounds she was hoping to hear. 

When she was satisfied that the boys were moving around in the living room and not continuing their video game, she turned her attention back to Sam. She was reminded, again, why she had been so fond of him before his stupid indiscretion ruined their friendship four years ago that very month. Sam had said the right things to Drew and Ethan, at least as far as Ali and Ashlyn were concerned. He had answered their questions without judging them or making them feel like the whole topic was taboo or off-limits. Ali and Ashlyn may not have considered Sam for the role but he had done a wonderful job of talking to the boys. Ali could tell Drew felt comfortable and at ease with everything that had happened that afternoon as soon as she saw his face. It was as carefree as she had seen it in days.

“Do you have your trumpet and music?” Ali asked when she didn’t see either thing with her boy.

“Ummm, Mama has them. She took them home from school for me” Drew explained after taking a few seconds to remember.

“Alright then” she smiled down at Drew as he hugged her hello, dragging his backpack behind him. “What do you say?”

“Thanks Mr. Machado. Thanks for the grilled cheese” his face brightened at the memory. “See you tomorrow Ethan.”

The Drew Krieger that sat at the nook table for dinner that night was a completely different kid than had sat there so anxiously at breakfast that morning. Ashlyn grinned from ear to ear when she saw her happy, funny, quirky son back to his normal self. She and Ali shared a loving, relieved look as they watched all four kids dig into Gram’s mac & cheese with nary a complaint. Ashlyn had made it with Drew in mind, eager to make sure he at least had one good meal that day. The kids joked around and laughed together as they all ate dinner. What a difference the family dynamic experienced when Drew was in a wonderful mood as he was that night. The euphoric feeling Drew had experienced after presenting his oral book report that morning had kept rolling all day long. He also felt giddy from getting caught watching videos he absolutely wasn’t supposed to be watching and then not getting punished for it. He was on cloud 9. Nothing dampened his mood. The other three kids blossomed under the approval and kindness and acceptance he showed them at times like that. Instead of cutting them off and telling them how impossible their idea was or how dumb their rationale was for whatever subject was being debated, Drew laughed with them and encouraged them and seemed to genuinely enjoy their company. Drew was usually a nice kid but it could be hard work being the big brother to three younger siblings sometimes. But to have all four kids getting along so well, at the dinner table no less, was a rare and beautiful thing and both moms appreciated the hell out of it. 

As the other kids went upstairs with Ashlyn to take their showers, Drew and Ali moved to the dining room table to get started on his homework. 

“Ugh, it smells like Ms. Clinton in here” he turned his nose up as he sat down and pulled his math book out of his backpack.

“Oh come on” Ali giggled at her son’s reference to Josie’s piano teacher who was only a couple of years older than Grandma Deb but who looked like an old, gray-haired spinster. “You make it sound like she stinks. You just don’t like her perfume” she replied while taking everything else out of the backpack and reading a note from his teacher about bringing canned goods to class with him on Friday that week for a food drive.

“Why anybody buys something that smells like that makes noooooooo sense” he shook his head quickly. “Gross.”

“Everybody’s different, don’t forget that” Ali leaned over and kissed the top of his dark brown head, leaving her arm around his shoulder as she looked down at the sheet of math questions on the table in front of him. “Alright, tell me what you’re doing here. How many do you have to do?”

45 minutes later he closed the textbook and let his mom put it and his homework folder into his backpack, ready for the next morning. They took one last look at his to do list for the night to make sure they hadn’t missed anything and smiled at each other.

“Done!” he grinned and jumped up out of the dining room chair he had been sitting in.

“What about your trumpet? Did you practice this afternoon?” Ali asked, knowing that he hadn’t.

“Ummm...” Drew looked down as he slowly wiggled his whole body and twisted his arms behind his back like a contortionist, joining his hands together. “No?” his high voice sounded like a question rather than an answer as he looked hopefully into his mother’s amused eyes.

“Practice three times a week” Ali quirked her eyebrow at him as she stood up and put her hands on her hips. “Monday is the easiest day to do one...”

“I know but I was at Ethan’s...” he whined, letting his body fall against Ali’s with his arms still clasped together behind his back, like some sort of trust exercise.

“Oof” she grunted as she supported his weight, stepping back a foot before steadying them both. “Well you’ll have to make it up another day this week, understood?”

“Yes!” he pumped his fist and lifted his head up, face grinning.

Ali couldn’t resist him anymore. She wrapped her arms around him and gave him a big hug, loving the fact that he didn’t try to squirm his way out of it. They swayed together for a minute, listening to the occasional sound of small, bare heels landing on the floor above them and Ashlyn’s raised voice as she worked her way through three kid showers. Ali rubbed his back and the back of his head as she spoke.

“Did Mrs. Urban really keep the poster you and Mama made?” she asked.

“Yep. Mine and Stuart’s and Gabby’s.”

“I’m really proud of you Drew” Ali kissed the top of his head and squeezed him, knowing she was running out of time to enjoy the sweet moment. He would be pulling away from her before she knew it. “You worked hard on that oral book report and on the poster and you got up there and presented it today like a rockstar. You did great honey.”

“Yeah” his voice was quiet but excited as he pulled back from the hug with a slight blush in his cheeks. “Can I have ice cream?”

“After you take your shower” she patted his butt as he took off towards the front stairs at a fast trot. He moved so quickly at first that he was almost out of her reach before she got her hand out. “Easy now” she laughed as she followed him into the front hall. “Don’t run anybody over.”

By the time Drew had showered it was just after 7:30pm. All the other kids were already enjoying their evening snack which was usually dessert. Sometimes Josie wanted chips though. It was kind of a potluck thing. You never knew who was going to ask for what. The three youngest kids were sitting on the longer edge of the couch in the front living room, using the coffee table for their small bowls of ice cream and trying to be careful and not spill. They were watching one of their kid shows intently and barely noticed when Drew joined them, freshly showered and jammied up. Ashlyn followed him into the room and smiled at the sight of Ali stretched out on the couch behind the three youngest kids. She was laying on her left side with her head up near the corner of the ‘L’ bend in the couch with Dodge in front of her chest, Josie in front of her hips and Lily in front of her knees. The brunette looked up at her wife and blinked affectionately while she took turns moving her hand gently across the kids’ backs. 

“I’ll do the dishes later, just leave them” Ali explained.

The two moms were still good about dividing and conquering with the kids and their hectic household. Ashlyn showered the three youngest kids and had them almost all dried off and dressed in their pajamas by the time Ali and Drew made it upstairs. Ali helped finish jammies and then took them downstairs to supervise the ice cream distribution. That was a full-attention duty that only took a few seconds to go horribly awry if you weren’t paying enough attention. Ashlyn tidied up the girls’ bathroom and then made sure Drew had gotten all the shampoo out of his thick hair when he was finishing up his shower. He was 9-1/2 and liked his privacy, but he let his moms help him because if he didn’t get all the shampoo out of his hair it itched him like crazy and he couldn’t sleep. He knew this from first-hand experience. The keeper helped Drew with his ice cream and stuck her finger in his chocolate sauce as she stepped over him to get to the corner bend of the couch.

“Hey!” he gave her a frown that turned into a grin and smacked her leg playfully. “Not cool Mama” he shook his head and turned his attention back to the tv.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about son” Ashlyn shrugged as she plopped down, making everybody else on the couch bounce a little bit, even the dogs who had each claimed a far end for their own.

“Whoa” Dodge laughed as they all settled back into place after the bounce. “Do that again!” he turned around to look at the keeper.

“No, no” Ali shook her head. “We’re done with that for the night.”

“Just eat your ice cream and watch the show Dodger” Ashlyn agreed. “We’re going to go up for storytime in...20 minutes” she looked at the time on the cable box and ruffled the curly blonde hair on his head.

Ali curled her left arm under Ashlyn’s nearby leg and tugged her keeper closer so she could use her thigh as a pillow. It was one of those moments that was almost too good to be true. The kids were all still in good moods and the two moms just drank it in. It was rare enough to have one of those blissful spans of time, forget about having it happen twice in one evening. That was just unheard of. But they had both learned not to question it. They just enjoyed it and prayed for it to continue. But even the good luck that had enveloped the big old house that evening had to run out sometime. And run out it did.

“Lily! I’ve told you three times to stop kicking your brother. I’m not telling you again. Next time you’ll be punished” Ashlyn barked out, interrupting her wife who was reading the next chapter in the book.

Dodge giggled nervously from his place on the spare twin bed in Josie’s room. He sat there with Drew, Lily and Ashlyn as Ali sat next to Josie in her canopied princess bed and read from the book. Ashlyn had her arm around Drew on one side and the other arm across both twins’ laps on the other side. It was usually enough to keep things calm if one of them got uppity. Dodge was usually not the culprit of any late-evening shenanigans. He got tired and was normally the first kid to fall asleep. Lily on the other hand seemed to get a second wind as soon as they all snuggled up together for storytime. Both moms thought it was probably the sugar from her snack or dessert but none of the other kids reacted the way Lily did. Drew rolled his eyes at his youngest siblings and tucked himself in closer to Ashlyn’s left side. They only made it a few more pages before Lily tested her Mama’s resolve.

“That’s it” Ashlyn said tersely as she stood up fast, pulling the blonde girl up off the bed with her. “You’re not ruining storytime for everybody else young lady” she continued as she carried the girl out of the room and down the hall into her own bedroom.

Ali waited a few seconds until she had the other kids’ attention again and then kept reading, making a mental note of the page she had been on when Lily had been removed from the room. One of them would have to go back and catch the girl up before the next night. Ten minutes later Ali and Ashlyn put Josie and Dodge to bed, tucking them in and kissing them goodnight. They spent a long few minutes in Lily’s room trying to find the right tone of loving disappointment so the girl wouldn’t be too upset to go to sleep. The family rule was that nobody should go to bed angry or upset, if it could at all be helped. So when one of the kids misbehaved right before bedtime, which was quite common, Ali and Ashlyn told them they would be punished and that they would talk about it the next day, effectively ending the drama for the night. That way the child could still get loving goodnight snuggles and kisses from both parents. Finally, the two moms found themselves in Drew’s room praising their boy for his big day and encouraging him to remember his success and let that build up his confidence for future presentations and reports. 

“And listen, mom and I want you to know that it’s ok for you to talk to Mr. Machado about questions you have about your body as you’re getting older” Ashlyn smiled at their son who immediately looked down and blushed deep red when he heard her words.

Ali had only had a chance to briefly bring Ashlyn up to speed on what Sam had told her when she picked Drew up at Ethan’s house that evening. The brunette wanted to take advantage of the interaction and talk to Drew about it the same day it happened but she didn’t want to blindside her wife in the process. Whenever Sam Machado was involved, Ali always went out of her way to account for Ashlyn’s feelings – regardless of what the subject was and this was a great example.

The two moms shared a nervous glance while Drew kept his eyes down.

“It’s ok to be embarrassed too, honey” Ali added. “You’re going to have questions and we just want to make sure you get the right answers, that’s all. There are a whole lot of places where you can get the wrong answers...”

“Like YouTube, and the internet and video games and movies...” Ashlyn interjected as she patted her son’s leg through the covers.

Drew looked up at them in surprise. He seemed shocked that they knew how and where Ethan and he had been starting their research. But, for the second time that evening, he didn’t appear to be in any trouble. He couldn’t believe his luck.

“We don’t have to talk about it now if you don’t want to, but we just want you to know that it’s completely normal and natural for you to wonder about things like girls and sex and why your body’s doing some of the things it might be doing. You’re supposed to ask those questions” Ali smiled warmly at the boy whose face was still pink.

“We’d like you to come to us and ask those questions, just like you have all your life” Ashlyn continued. “We’ve always answered them honestly and done our best to make sure you understood those answers. But as you start getting older you may not want to ask us about sex and your body. We hope you do Drew” she squeezed his leg and he looked up again. “You can always talk to us about anything. Forever. That’s what we’re here for.”

“But if you don’t want to, someday, and you want to talk to another boy or man about it instead, you already know you can talk to Uncle Chris and Uncle Kyle and Uncle Nathan and Uncle Koty and Grandpa and Papa and Dom and Ryan too, right?” Ali asked him carefully.

“Yeah, I know” he squirmed under the attention.

“Ok good, well we want you to know it’s ok for you to talk to Mr. Machado about it too if you want” Ashlyn explained, adding Sam to their safe grown-ups list. They knew their boy was shy and they wanted him to be able to choose who he confided in on the sensitive subject. “Ok?”

“Yeah, ok” Drew nodded. “Can I go to sleep now?” he asked as he snuggled lower into his bed.

“Yes sweet boy, you can. I love you.” Ali kissed him on the forehead and got off the bed to give Ashlyn room to get up towards his face.

“Have a good sleep buddy. I love you. See you in the morning” Ashlyn winked at him after kissing him goodnight and standing up.

Drew lay there for several minutes as his heartrate returned to normal after the embarrassing conversation with his mothers. Before he could figure out exactly how he felt about talking to them, or Mr. Machado, or anybody else about girls and sex, images from his favorite video game pushed into his brain. In another minute he was going over his gameplay strategy in his mind and trying to map out a way to get past his current top level. He considered changing his weapon load out and even modifying the abilities and traits of his character to aid in his quest for level 24. And then, ten minutes later, he was fast asleep, his 9-1/2 year old mind and body exhausted from another busy day. If only his moms could know that their son’s primary focus was still on video games and not, as they worried, sex and girls, they might have drifted off to a peaceful sleep that night too.


	2. Josie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I never really know what needs a warning. There's some bullying in this chapter. Nothing too serious, but, there you go.

Tuesday morning dawned much the same way Monday morning had, except Drew was still riding the high from his successful prior day. Josie had also woken up happier than usual. She was always pumped after her weekly private music lesson with Ms. Clinton. Josie Krieger had always shown an affinity for music, even as a little baby. She had been so small and sickly, just struggling to thrive so she could grow enough to hold her own on a daily basis. Basics like breathing and eating had been challenging for the little redhead and nothing had come easy to her during the first year of her life. Nothing other than the oceans of love she received from both of her moms. Even though both Ali and Ashlyn had been tired and worried and, for a long time that summer, fighting and disconnected, they showered their baby girl with love and adoration. It didn’t really have anything to do with it, but the fact that once her two moms had begun healing their fractured relationship that summer Josie had begun giggling and laughing in her sleep, had not escaped notice. Deb had been the first to see it and make the connection. Once things were better between Ali and Ashlyn, poor, miserable, sickly Josie had started to laugh while she was asleep and it was the sweetest, and most-welcome, thing either mom had ever heard.

Now, at the ripe old age of 7-1/2, music had become Josie’s favorite thing. And that was really saying something because the girl loved to draw and color more than most children any of the Krieger clan had ever seen. She couldn’t wait to get to third grade because that was when she could pick an instrument and start to play it, just as Drew had chosen the trumpet last year. Josie spent hours trying to decide which instrument she would play, changing her mind time and time and time again. Next year she would go to Rockport once a week for her private lesson on whatever instrument she finally decided on, just as Drew did now with his trumpet. She would play in the school band twice a week and perform in the holiday concert and the spring concert, just as Drew did now. Josie already loved going to school and this new augmented music program seemed like a dream come true for her. She would continue to go to the group music lesson up in Rockport, with the rest of her siblings, until she got too bored with it. There wasn’t an age limit on the program but it was designed to be a basic foundation for beginners to learn to read music and practice scales on the keyboard and perform simple songs at the holiday and spring recitals. Kids would play tambourine and cowbell and drums and piano while other kids sang and clapped along to the song. The music center in Rockport was a wonderful place for anybody to learn about music and the teachers there had all recognized Josie’s talent and love for it right away. All four of the Krieger kids enjoyed those music classes, and even Drew, as he got older, continued to attend. It was a big part of what kept Ali and Ashlyn so busy with their kids’ activities. Between sports and music they were always on their way to or from something and it became more and more difficult to eat dinner together at the same time every night.

“Mama, how old is Ms. Clinton?” Josie asked that morning after breakfast as she was getting dressed for school.

“Uhh, I’m not sure sweetie” Ashlyn replied as she looked through the hair ties and bands and barrettes in the small tote on top of the extra bed in Josie’s bedroom. She turned her head towards the open bedroom door and shouted to her wife who was in Lily’s room. “It’s not here Hon. Have you checked the downstairs bathroom?”

“But, is she old old? Like Mrs. Ornstein old?” Josie asked as she pulled a purple sweater over her head which made her hair stand up and out, full of static.

The keeper paused when she heard her daughter mention their neighbor who had lived across the street from the big old house for as long as Ashlyn could remember. She was the oldest person the kids knew and she was in her 90s but still hanging on. She had hired live-in help because she refused to leave her house and because she could afford it. Ashlyn still took the dogs and the kids over to visit her every couple of weeks or so. They didn’t stay too long because the ruckus was often overwhelming for the old lady. But the keeper knew she loved the visits. She could see the twinkle in her faded eyes every time.

“I don’t think she’s that old” Ashlyn answered as she quickly threw things back into the hair accessories tote and put the lid back onto it. “I think she’s a little older than Grandma. Why do you ask?”

“I don’t want her to be old old” Josie replied as she adjusted her skirt and tugged one more time on her tights, hair still sticking straight up and out everywhere.

“Why not? Old people are important and do all kinds of cool things you know” Ashlyn turned to face the room, her eyes going wide at the sight of her daughter’s hair. “Yikes, got some static there girlie, huh?” she chuckled. “Come here and let me spray it” she reached for the pump bottle of moisturizing spray on the dresser as Josie put her hands up to feel her hair and giggled.

The redhead walked to Ashlyn and turned around, talking while the keeper lightly sprayed her head and then carefully combed through her thin, straight hair.

“I don’t want her to die. I really like taking lessons with her” she shrugged while Ashlyn’s mouth dropped open behind her, out of her view.

The keeper didn’t know what to say so she just stood there while Josie turned around to face her. Just then Ali entered the room at a trot and made a bee-line for the hair accessory tote on the extra bed at the front of the room. She hadn’t heard their conversation and had no idea what she had just walked into.

“Mommy, how old is Ms. Clinton?” 

“Umm, let’s see...” the words came out of the brunette’s mouth quickly as she searched the tote, bent over at the waist with hands moving as fast as possible. Ashlyn and Josie both stood behind her, watching. “She’s two years older than Grandma...and Grandma’s...” she paused and squinted as she did the math in her head, “68. So that makes her 70. I think” Ali stood up clutching a bright pink hair elastic with a tiny, plastic, pink flamingo glued onto it. “Aha! Found it” she turned and glared at her wife who gave her a sheepish, apologetic smile in return. “That sweater looks really nice with your skirt Jose” the brunette complimented her daughter and kept moving.

“I looked, I swear I had half of that crap out on the bed...” Ashlyn tried to defend herself.

Ali rolled her eyes and moved quickly to the door, hurrying to finish doing Lily’s hair so they could leave the house on time. Pink flamingos had become the little girl’s latest obsession and she had been having a fit because she couldn’t find the pink elastic that matched her pink flamingo sweatshirt. A classic Lily breakdown was imminent and the brunette was trying desperately to avoid it.

“Does that mean she’s gonna die soon? If she’s 70?” Josie’s small but clear voice stopped Ali in her tracks, hand on the doorframe pulling herself back into the open doorway with her eyebrows raised high.

“I got it” Ashlyn waved her wife off and nodded reassuringly when Ali quirked her eyebrow at her. “We’re in the middle of something here. Just, go do what you need to do. I got this.”

The brunette hesitated for a split second as Ashlyn squatted down in front of Josie with her hands on the girl’s hips. But then she left them to it, confident that the keeper could handle it. She couldn’t find a simple pink flamingo elastic that was the key to their whole freaking morning, but she could handle a spur of the moment death conversation with their 7-year old. Marriage and kids were crazy sometimes.

“Listen, I don’t want you to be worrying about all of these big things all the time little one” she cupped Josie’s cheek and smiled at her inquisitive face. “The truth is that everybody dies at a different time and you never really know when it’s going to happen...”

“You mean it could happen any time?” Josie’s eyes practically popped out of her head.

“No, no, only when you’re really old. Don’t worry about it honey, please” the keeper took a deep breath and tried again, her daughter’s face still full of concern and fear. “All I mean is that when you’re really old, like Mrs. Ornstein, you don’t know when you’re going to die. That’s all.”

“But will Ms. Clinton still teach me piano when she’s old old like Mrs. Ornstein?” the girl scrunched her face up in confusion.

“Maybe, but maybe not” Ashlyn shrugged and smiled. “You know how Grandpa Mike retired and now he doesn’t have to go to work anymore? Do you remember that?”

“Ah-huh” she nodded and Ashlyn could see the wheels turning in her little head.

“Well Ms. Clinton might retire when she doesn’t feel like working anymore.”

“But playing piano isn’t working” Josie reasoned with a frown. “It’s fun.”

“You’re right about that Jojo” Ashlyn chuckled and stood up. “And I think you and Ms. Clinton feel the same way about that, that’s for sure.”

“I think I’m just gonna ask her next time” Josie took Ashlyn’s hand as they walked out of the room and started down the front stairs together. “Maybe she knows.”

“Maybe you should. I think we should talk to Mommy about it first though. She knew how old she was. Maybe she knows when she’s planning to retire too.”

“Mommy’s so smart” Josie grinned. “When I grow up I want to be as smart as her.”

There was a good example of how unintentionally painful kids’ remarks could be. Josie in no way meant to hurt Ashlyn’s feelings by talking about how smart Ali was. And both moms had been repeatedly dinged by ‘harmless’ comments like that one since Drew had learned to talk. They knew better than to take them personally. Josie didn’t even really know how smart Ali was, or Ashlyn. In her 7-year old mind, Ali was the smartest person she knew because she always had the answers to her questions – which were usually about when things were happening and what was going to happen at the events she was going to attend. Ali knew all of those things because she was the mom generally in charge of scheduling everything for the family so it was natural for all the kids to think she was a brainiac with an answer for almost every question. 

“That’s a very good goal to have” Ashlyn nodded. “Maybe you’ll be even smarter than Mommy” she grinned when she saw the astonishment on her daughter’s face as she tried to imagine that possibility.

“Whoa” was all Josie said as her head spun.

Josie moved through her morning classes - math and reading, morning recess, and the second lunch period. Josie was in a unique position in the Krieger family that year. She had the middle, or second of three, lunch period and the lunch periods overlapped. Josie spent the first half of her lunch period while both Dodge and Lily finished their first lunch period. They didn’t sit together or anything like that, but Josie always made sure to spot her younger siblings. Dodge was easy to find, surrounded by friends and usually laughing loudly in the group. Lily was much more reserved at school, still getting her confidence back after overcoming her stutter and mumble issues. Josie never relaxed into her own lunch until she had located both twins. Then, after the first lunch period ended, the third lunch period began and Drew and the rest of the 4th and 5th graders took over the cafeteria, joining the 2nd and 3rd graders. Josie did the same thing again, finding her big brother as she ate her lunch and talked with her friends. It never occurred to her that Drew might be looking for her too, doing the big brother thing without even meaning to. The Krieger kids had learned early that they were a team and they all looked out for one another, especially big brother and sister. 

After lunch Josie went to science class, then second recess and then, finally, closed out the school day with her fourth class of the day – writing. She was a good student, always attentive and inquisitive. She just loved to learn new things. Her overall enjoyment of school was aided by the fact that she was very smart. Things came to her easily and she found everything simpler than most of her classmates. Not everything was easy for her though. 

January was a prime time for new students to join a school, second in popularity only to the beginning of the school year in September. Every year there were one or two transfers into the East Gloucester Elementary school. Last year it had been a 5th grader who spent 5-1/2 months getting to know his schoolmates and then moved to middle school with most of them to start the next year. The year before that it had been a kindergartener and 2nd grader, brother and sister, and they were both still at the school. This year it was a 3rd grade girl who had two older siblings, one in middle school and one already in high school. Franny Higgins had only been at school for a week and now two days but she had already proven herself to be a bossy, aggressive, loudmouth. She was a year younger than Drew but even most of the kids in his 4th grade class knew who the loud new girl was from riding the bus with her. She was average in every way, except for the volume of her voice. She wasn’t smarter or prettier or braver than any of the other kids – she was just like everyone else. Except louder. She wasn’t even that funny, but kids laughed at her jokes because she delivered them full voice which compelled others to laugh along with her. She hadn’t made any real friends yet, although it was only her 7th day of class in her new school, but she had some followers who were intrigued by her bold and sometimes boorish behavior.

The teachers knew that Franny was probably nervous about being new and trying to cover up her fear with false confidence. They also knew that she was the youngest of three kids and that she had to raise her voice to be heard among them sometimes. Both of her parents worked full-time so Franny spent her afternoons under the supervision of one or the other of her older siblings. Having a 15-year old girl or an 11-year old boy in charge of an 8-year old girl had a lot of potential for trouble, and Franny’s aggressive personality and demeanor seemed to be a direct result.

“Hey Gi-rash girl, hurry up will ya?” Franny teased and laughed as she watched Josie work her way across the monkey bars during the shared 2nd grade/3rd grade afternoon recess. 

She had cleverly injected the word ‘rash’ into the word ‘giraffe’. This empowered her with a double insult – first making fun of Josie’s giraffe birthmark and then doubling down on it by suggesting it was ugly enough to look like a yucky rash.

“I can’t start the ten-second quarantine until you and your gross rash are off the monkey bars. So move it!!” she yelled and laughed out loud at her own joke.

Josie, still much smaller than most of the girls her age, was only about halfway across the monkey bars, with her friend Kayla just getting to the end ahead of her. The little redhead felt her blood boil when she heard Franny’s loud voice behind her. She was impressed by her use of such a big word like quarantine and thought, for a quick moment, that they might have been friends under different circumstances. Josie’s face flushed from fury and embarrassment and the effort it was taking her to get across the monkey bars. Upper body strength was never ever going to be one of Josephine Krieger’s best physical attributes. Kayla jumped down off the top foot rung at the end of the monkey bars and turned around to face her friend.

“You’re almost there Josie, just keep coming. You can do it” Kayla’s voice was quiet but urgent. She knew Josie had trouble on the monkey bars. The only reason they were even on them was because nobody else wanted to take their mittens off and touch the freezing cold metal bars so they were free and available. Josie usually got about ¾ of the way across and then dropped down to the ground. But Kayla also knew that her stubborn friend would never give up after a challenge like that from anyone. “Don’t listen to her.”

“Oh my God, we’re gonna be here forever” Franny complained loudly. “Hurry up you freak!”

A couple of 3rd grade girls from Franny’s class gathered around her, emboldening her, as most of the kids from Josie and Kayla’s class moved quietly away to other playground equipment. Recess was only 15 minutes long but everybody still looked forward to getting outside and running around a little bit, even on a chilly January afternoon. Josie’s small, bare hands clutched at the monkey bars as she moved to the next rung. She gritted her teeth and set her jaw, determined to make it all the way across. She had three rungs left and her arms were already screaming at her to let go. Kayla looked around the playground just outside the school building to see if any of the teachers were nearby, but of course they weren’t. In their defense, nobody was using the stupid monkey bars so they had positioned themselves closer to the bigger groups of kids. They had four classes, a total of between 85 – 90 boys and girls, to monitor out there as they ran around and let off steam.

“She’s so slow” one of the other 3rd grade girls commented and rolled her eyes.

“Well look how small she is” another girl laughed.

“Yeah” Franny chimed in, exhilarated by the support from her two classmates. “That disgusting rash on her neck probably stunted her growth.”

They all laughed while Josie’s eyes narrowed. 

“I heard none of her family can even touch her or they’ll catch it too.”

“I heard she’s got that gross rash all over her body but her clothes cover it up.”

“I heard the school nurse won’t even let her in her office. If she gets sick she just goes right home so she can’t contaminate anybody else” Franny laughed again. “If you don’t get off these monkey bars now I’m gonna take you off of them” she threatened and walked around the starting ladder so she was standing a couple of feet behind Josie’s hanging body. 

Josie knew Franny was behind her mostly from the frightened look on Kayla’s face in front of her. Her arms were up over her ears so she couldn’t hear footsteps or movement as well as usual. But she could sure hear that loud mouth. Out of the corner of her eye she saw one of the other girls move to her left side, and then the other one move to her right side. Kayla’s face changed from fear to terror as she looked around again for a teacher. Josie set her jaw and swung with all her might to the next bar, leaving two more to go. But the 3rd grade girls moved with her, this time Franny pushed Josie’s butt from behind, making her swing wildly forward and then back. The redhead thought for a moment about kicking the bully on her backswing but she couldn’t see her and wasn’t sure where exactly she was. With her luck, Josie would miss the kick and end up falling flat on her face in the middle of them. No, the only thing to do was hang on and get to the end. If only her arms weren’t so tired and her hands so cold and stiff.

“Whoa, she made it to another one! I didn’t think she had it in her!” Franny’s boisterous laugh rang out.

“Leave her alone” Kayla tried to be brave.

“Leave her alone? Why should we leave her alone?” Franny taunted and then laughed when one of the other girls pushed Josie’s hip and sent her body swinging sideways. “She’s wrecking my whole recess. I wanted to use the monkey bars and she’s been on them the whole time!”

“Yeah, we don’t have to leave her alone” the third girl sneered and pushed Josie from the other side, nearly knocking her off of the monkey bars altogether.

“Oh! Good one” Franny nodded at her classmate. “You almost got her. Push her again” she urged the girl on the other side. “This is even more fun than the monkey bars” Franny laughed.

Josie clung to the monkey bar for dear life. Her brain was telling her to drop down and run away. But her everything else was telling her to hold on and try and get to the next rung. Her hands were so cold she could barely feel them anymore and her arms were so sore and tired that they ached. The reduced blood flow from being in that position for so long wasn’t helping any either. She narrowed her beautiful blue eyes and got ready to try and get to the next rung. But before she could make the attempt, Franny pushed her hard from behind again and then her classmate pushed her immediately after that from the side. Josie felt her numb fingers slipping and knew she wasn’t going to be able to make it to the next rung, and certainly not the one after that at the end. She honestly thought she was going to fall, and she was swinging so violently from the pushes that she wasn’t at all sure she would be able to land on her feet. For the first time she regretted not dropping down as soon as she had heard Franny’s obnoxious voice in the first place.

“Whoa, she almost fell” one of the girls laughed. “Push her again, she can’t hang on forever.”

“But don’t touch her skin! Watch out for the rash!” the other girl cautioned quickly.

“You’re going down, Girash girl. And it’s gonna be awesome!” Franny laughed again.

“Alright girls, recess is over” Mrs. Wilson called out as she walked quickly towards the monkey bars.

The bell hadn’t rung yet and that was what always signaled the end of recess and the other classes for that matter. The three 3rd grade girls looked at each other and stepped away as Kayla moved swiftly to stop her friend from swinging. The bell rang a few seconds later and Mrs. Wilson helped Josie to the ground, rubbing her arms once she was standing on her own two feet. She was Josie and Kayla’s teacher and she was in her early 30’s and she had always tried to look out for the young Krieger girl. The teachers at the school knew about Josie and her birthmark and they all did their best to be aware of the potential bullying that always seemed to rear its ugly head at some point during the school year. The boys and girls who had been in Josie’s class since kindergarten were never the problem. The show and tell Ali and Josie had done for the kindergarten class had alleviated any problems by simply talking about the birthmark and explaining what it was and how little it had to do with anything else.

“Everything ok here girls?” the teacher asked, making eye contact with the redhead and lifting her eyebrows expectantly and kindly.

Franny and her two classmates had turned on their heels as soon as they heard the bell and were hustling across the playground towards the school. Kayla looked over Mrs. Wilson’s shoulder at her friend’s red face as it fought to contain the tears in those blue eyes. Josie took a few deep breaths and nodded her head, happy to be able to feel something other than pain in her arms again.

“Yep. I’m ok.”

As soon as the final school bell rang, Josie went to the gymnasium to meet up with Dodge, Lily, Drew and Ashlyn just as she did every day. Ashlyn ushered everybody into her Jeep and made the 15-minute drive up to Rockport and their group music lesson. The kids knew that if they hustled into the vehicle and didn’t dawdle after school there would be just enough time for a fruit smoothie drink on the way. The smoothie shop was just a few doors down from the music studio and it usually worked out well. It was a great carrot to dangle in front of the kids to get them to hustle along at a time of day when they weren’t always in the mood to do so. If it was warm out they would sit on the benches next to the street and talk and drink their smoothies. This chilly day they took a table in the corner and tried not to disrupt everybody else in the small shop.

“Sorry” Ashlyn grimaced as she caught the back of a chair that was about to fall over as her horde moved clumsily past it. She righted it and smiled apologetically at the man sitting at the table but he just rolled his eyes and sighed audibly. “Yeah, I think you’ll live” she muttered under her breath and followed the kids, shushing them and reminding them to use their indoor voices.

The key to the whole thing was ordering quickly. If they could order and get their drinks in 5 minutes then they would have 8 minutes to enjoy them with the snacks Ashlyn brought from home, and then still have 2 minutes to walk to the music studio. The rule was that as soon as they opened the door to the smoothie shop they all had to have their final decisions made or they would get whatever their mother felt like ordering for them. The only child who had ever challenged the rule was Lily because she was easily the most indecisive of the four young kids. That had been a shitshow but Lily never made that mistake again. Dodge had done it once but only because he thought it would be fun to not know what kind of drink he was getting. Ashlyn had taken pity on him and ordered him something she was pretty sure he would like. She had done the same thing with Lily but it still hadn’t helped in that case. But she knew nothing ever could.

The music lesson went from 3-4pm and Ashlyn sat in one of the uncomfortable, aluminum folding chairs with a couple of other moms. This was the first lesson of the spring term and everybody was just happy to be back and spent more time than usual chatting and horsing around. The two teachers knew what to expect because they had been doing this for several years now. The only goal for this particular lesson was to get the kids, ranging in age from 4 to 10 which equated to preschool to 5th grade, settled down enough to introduce them to the new song they were going to try and learn for the spring recital. It was hysterical to watch the 4-year old try to keep up with the rest of the group. But they had all been there. Every kid in the class had been that clueless, uncoordinated 4-year old who never ever got it right, not even in the recital. Ashlyn was always surprised when whatever song they were practicing actually sounded good for more than a few fleeting moments. But the kids had fun and loved going to the class so the keeper was all for it. The teachers were good about finding parts for all of the different kids to play, depending on skill level. 

“So how was school today?” Ali asked as they ate dinner that evening. 

Dodge launched into a funny story about his best friend Mikey and how he tripped over his own two feet on the way to recess and wiped out in the hallway, taking out two other classmates at the same time. Lily giggled along and added her own cute comments to the story and even Drew was laughing by the end of it. Josie was quiet as she ate her spaghetti and meatballs, with the spaghetti cut up into manageable fork-size lengths.

“How about you Jose?” the brunette tilted her head the girl’s way, surprised that she hadn’t followed up Dodge’s story with one of her own. 

The room was quiet as Josie shrugged her shoulders and kept chewing. Ali glanced quickly at Ashlyn but the keeper shook her head slightly to let her know she had no information to add.

“Well, how was music class this afternoon?” Ali tried again. “Did you find out the new song?”

“Oh yeah! It’s...it’s...it’s...” Lily stammered, excited to answer the question.

“Yellow Submarine!” Dodge finished eagerly for her and immediately cringed when he realized what he had done.

“Dodge” Ashlyn shook her head at him.

“Sorry Wee...” he apologized to his sister and then looked from one of his mothers to the other. “I couldn’t help it.”

“Try harder next time” Ali quirked her eyebrow at him but noted that he seemed genuinely sorry, which was not always the case.

“There are all kinds of weird sounds in it and it’s pretty cool” Drew added.

“Yeah, it’s s’posed to be the s...submarine!” Lily giggled and then grinned.

“Wow, that’s a great song” Ali smiled at them all and shared another concerned look with her wife. Josie still hadn’t said anything.

“Ok, Jojo” Ashlyn checked the time on her phone and stood up. “We’ve gotta get to practice. The coach can’t be late” she chuckled. “Finish your dinner as quick as you can and I’ll bring down your basketball clothes...”

“I already brought them down” Ali pointed towards the nearby family room couch. “All you have to do is get changed. And wash the sauce off of your face” she giggled at her daughter sitting in the chair next to her and caressed the back of her red head.

“Who’s better than Mommy?” Ashlyn walked around the table and leaned down over her wife, waiting for the brunette to tilt her face up. “Nobody” the keeper answered her own question and gave Ali a soft kiss on the lips.

Ali tried to leave work a little earlier than usual on days when the kids had multiple things on their afternoon and evening schedule. Today they had the music lesson and then Ashlyn and Josie had basketball practice from 6-7pm. Ali got home just after 4pm and got Josie’s basketball bag and clothes ready for her and then made dinner so they could eat a half hour early. Ashlyn and the kids arrived at about 4:15 and ran around like crazy people until it was time to eat dinner at 5pm. The brunette would be in charge of homework after dinner tonight and she had made a note to remind herself to make sure Drew practiced his trumpet for 30 minutes too. There was no way she was going to let him get to Wednesday evening and still have 3 practice sessions still to go. That was a recipe for disaster and would mean trouble all weekend long.

“Aww, do we have to go too?” Drew whined, knowing that sometimes the whole crew had to go along when one of their moms was coaching.

“Nope” Ali beamed at him, enjoying the look of relief on his face. “You three get to stay here with me and do your homework” she chuckled.

All three kids groaned.

“Hey, if we settle right down and get it done, we’ll be done by 6:30 and then have a whole hour before we do showers tonight” the brunette countered, changing up the schedule so the kids could relax a little bit. Planning 30 minutes for homework was conservative. Dodge and Lily’s homework usually only took about 15 minutes, if they even had any. 

Ashlyn stood behind her wife, hands on her shoulders, and watched Josie’s face work through several different emotions before the girl sighed and finished her chocolate milk. 

“I’ll clear your plate for you tonight little one” Ali patted Josie’s leg. “Let Mama help you get cleaned up before you get sauce on your basketball clothes.”

The keeper knew something was bothering Josie but she wasn’t sure how big a deal it was. The little girl’s face told her she had thought about asking not to go to basketball practice. But Ashlyn knew how excited Josie had been to go to her first basketball practice of the year. The week before had been the first week back after the Christmas holiday break and none of the extracurriculars started until this week. This would be Josie’s second year of basketball and she felt confident about what was expected of her and what she needed to do so both she and Ashlyn thought she would enjoy it even more this year. 

“Kayla! You’ve gotta move your feet on defense. Always try to keep your body between the other team’s players and the basket” Ashlyn yelled out, 45 minutes into the practice, as she approached the girl.

The big gym at the Middle school was busy and loud with four different youth teams practicing on it at the same time. The main basketball court was equipped with smaller and shorter baskets on both sides of the court. If you divided the main court in half you had two smaller courts. At each end of those smaller courts there would be a smaller, shorter basket for the kids to aim for. It was a great plan and it was the only way all the teams could practice during the week and still be finished by 7pm. The only problem was that it was insanely loud in there and the only way any of the players could hear their coaches was if they shouted out their instructions. It wasn’t an angry shout, but it was still a full-on yell, regardless of the intent, and some of the girls bristled at it in the beginning. Nobody ever really enjoyed being yelled at. Some of the girls were completely overwhelmed and distracted by all the other commotion in the gym to begin with. Even though they had been through it the year before, it was still loud and raucous in there.

“Josie!” Ashlyn yelled again after helping Kayla into the correct position in their team’s little quarter of the basketball court. “You need to be ready to catch the ball, all the time. Chloe wanted to pass to you but you weren’t looking.”

Another minute went by and the ball moved slowly among the girls.

“Farrah! Don’t be afraid of the ball honey. If you close your eyes you won’t be able to see it and that’s when it will hit you. Remember?” the keeper patted the girl on her back and gave her an encouraging smile. “Ok, everybody! Let’s try it again. Remember, bounce passes only! Watch the ball!”

Ashlyn and Margot, the same assistant coach from last year who was also Farrah’s mom, helped the girls get into a 4 vs 4 formation and then blew the whistle to start playing again. The two coaches moved around the perimeter of the players, giving them more instructions whenever necessary – which was a lot. The girls on offense dribbled the ball a few times, bounce-passed it around the outside once or twice, and then hucked it into the middle towards Izzy who was the tallest girl on the team. Izzy would turn and huck the ball up towards the basket with varying degrees of success depending on whether or not she actually looked at the basket first. Kayla had moved her feet as instructed and slid into the middle to provide some resistance to Izzy and the tall girl panicked and looked wild-eyed towards her coaches.

“Pass it back outside! Pass it back outside!” Ashlyn yelled, seeing that both Chloe and Josie were wide open.

Izzy spotted Josie first and threw the ball as hard as she could towards her, whizzing it over the other defenders’ heads along the way. It wasn’t that hard of a pass, but these were 7-year old girls, some of whom were still pretty small. To them, it was a rocket. Josie saw the ball coming and did her best to catch it. She got both hands up and tried to contain the ball as it made contact with them. But the ball was coming in too hot and it slid between her small hands and hit her right in the face. All the girls gasped, as did both coaches and a couple of the parents who were watching from the stands. Josie stood there for 5 seconds as the ball bounced away and everybody held their breath. And then she started wailing.

“Oh honey, that really hurt didn’t it” Ashlyn tried to soothe her as she knelt in front of her and wrapped the girl up in her arms. “Where did it hit you? Let me see” she leaned back and pulled Josie’s hands from her face so she could take a look. 

Margot trotted over with an ice-pack from the cooler that they kept on hand just for these moments and they both looked at Josie’s bloody upper lip.

“Did it hit you in the nose, or just the mouth?”

“My mouth” Josie sobbed, hot tears rolling down both of her red cheeks.

“Ok little one, I’ve got you, you’re ok” Ashlyn cooed as she held her close again.

She nodded at Margot who called in one of the two subs to take Josie’s place and then got the girls back to practicing. Ashlyn picked her daughter up and carried her over to the bench area and sat down with Josie on her lap, crying into her chest. Several of the parents told Josie they knew she’d be ok in no time and gave her other words of encouragement as the last 10 minutes of practice went on. The lone sub left on the bench sat there and stared at Josie the whole time, unable to look away from the girl whose sobs only seemed to be getting stronger.

“Hey, Josie, shhh...” the keeper tried to calm her daughter again, offering her a drink of water and rubbing her back. “You need to calm down now baby girl, you’re getting yourself all worked up. It’s ok honey. You did a great job and you almost caught that pass. That was a really hard pass too” Ashlyn kissed the top of her forehead and started to get anxious herself when the crying just kept going strong.

One of the other coaches, who was an EMT, came over to check on her but Ashlyn waved him off. She knew her girl and this wasn’t Josie in pain crying. This was Josie having one of her meltdowns crying. Practice ended and Margot took over the pep talk and reminded everybody of the details for their first game Saturday morning. All of the girls came over to pat Josie on the arm on their way out of the gym with their parents but the redhead still cried. Her tears had slowed a little bit, but not very much. Finally Kayla and her mom, Pam, came over with serious faces.

“You ok Jojo?” the girl asked.

Josie sucked in a deep breath and whimpered, trying to make her tears stop but not quite managing it. She nodded and took another shuddering breath as Pam and Ashlyn exchanged a look.

“I can’t believe you almost caught that” Kayla’s eyes were wide. “I wouldn’t have even tried. I would have just moved out of the way” she giggled.

Ashlyn could feel Josie starting to relax a little bit and she shifted her to the bench so she was sitting next to Kayla.

“Here, have some water honey” the keeper held her water bottle out for her and watched her guzzle almost half of it down. “Good job sweetie.” She rubbed her back from her seat next to Josie and then turned to face Pam who had sat down on Ashlyn’s other side. “What’s going on?” she whispered, not wanting either girl to hear.

“I don’t know if it has anything to do with this or not” Pam whispered back and nodded at Josie, referencing her overblown reaction to the injury. “But Kay told me that she had a run-in with one of the 3rd graders today.”

“Who did?” Ashlyn felt every muscle in her body clench in anger.

“Josie” Pam replied solemnly. “I didn’t get any details but...” she shrugged, not knowing what else to say.

“Thanks Pam” the keeper sighed and closed her eyes for a couple of seconds to try and control her swirling emotions before turning back to her daughter.

Josie seemed less distraught and Ashlyn wasn’t sure if it had been the water, the passage of time, or the camaraderie of her friend that had helped. She kept rubbing Josie’s back as her mind raced.

“What do you mean a ‘run-in’?” Ali’s eyes flashed with anger and worry thirty minutes later as they huddled together at home, whispering in the far end of the kitchen by the sink and the back stairs.

“I don’t know. She wouldn’t tell me anything about it. I tried the whole ride home and nothing.”

“Oh the poor thing. I knew something was bothering her at dinner, and now her lip...”

“Yeah, that was a tough pass too” Ashlyn shook her head. “She’s absolutely gonna have a fat lip. Poor baby.”

They spent another quick minute strategizing and then moved into the front living room to get everybody upstairs for showers and then a quick storytime before bed. Ashlyn took Drew, Dodge and Lily upstairs for showers, leaving Ali to help Josie with her homework. Normally they would have switched roles because they had each done the same thing the night before and doing showers by yourself two nights in a row sucked. But Ashlyn thought Josie might talk to Ali whereas she hadn’t said a word to the keeper.

“Alright Jose, what have we got tonight?” the brunette pulled the homework folder out of her backpack as they sat next to each other at the big dining room table.

It was almost funny how Ashlyn’s precious dining room table had turned into the homework area over the years. They had even tried to switch it last year and eat their meals at the dining room table and do their homework at the nook table, but it just didn’t feel right. Maybe someday they’d make the switch. Maybe they wouldn’t. For now though, the dining room was quiet and the big table afforded them all lots of room to work at the same time without bothering each other.

“Reading” Josie replied softly, lifting the small ice pack off of her upper lip and putting it back as soon as she was done.

“Ok, well, I think we’re going to have to modify this tonight” Ali explained after reading the homework instructions from Mrs. Wilson. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be reading aloud to me with your lip like that, so I’m going to read to you, ok?”

Josie nodded and gave the brunette a grateful smile. Ali picked the girl up, groaning a little at how heavy she was, and carried her and the book to the love seat in the front parlor. That room had always been one of Ali’s very favorite places in the house and she knew it was one of Josie’s too. It was the room with the piano in it after all. They sat together on the love seat in front of the bay window so they were each facing one of their favorite things – the piano and ‘El Jaleo’ still hanging on the same wall as the piano. Persey whined from behind the gate to the dining room and then plopped herself down there like some sort of protest. She did not like to be excluded. Ali spent 15 minutes reading to her daughter as the girl sat on her lap with her head resting back against the brunette’s chest, ice pack held to her lip. It was probably one of the easiest homework assignments they could have received that night and Ali was happy that the universe had seen fit to give her baby girl that one tiny break. She could feel Josie’s body starting to wind down as her breathing steadied and her arms and legs got heavy. What she really needed to do was take her upstairs for her shower but she decided to take a crack at the mysterious run-in from school instead.

“Do you want to talk about what happened at school today?” Ali asked in a calm, even voice as they sat in the same positions. 

Ali’s legs were stretched out on the coffee table in front of her and Josie’s legs were similarly stretched out on top of hers. The brunette moved her hands along her daughter’s hips and legs, slowly soothing her and reassuring her at the same time. Josie took one of her mother’s hands and pulled it up onto her stomach so she could hold it in both of her small hands, letting the ice pack slip to the love seat. Ali felt her heart clench at the sweet gesture. Josie always liked to play with her fingers when they snuggled together. The brunette didn’t rush her answer but she felt encouraged when Josie took a big breath and sighed.

“Not really” she mumbled.

“What honey? I couldn’t hear you...”

“Not really” she repeated, louder.

“Oh, ok” Ali stayed calm and steady. “Well, I’d really like to hear about it. I can go talk to Mrs. Wilson tomorrow morning but I’d rather hear it from you.”

They were both quiet for a couple of minutes, the only things they could hear were the ticking of the grandfather clock in the front hallway and the muffled sounds of shower time coming from upstairs. Ali moved both of her hands so they were palm up on Josie’s belly and smiled to herself when her daughter put both of her small hands into them, patting them slowly and feeling the lines and ridges with her tiny fingertips. Her body still felt relaxed and her breathing stayed steady so Ali pushed a little bit.

“Was somebody at school mean to you today?”

“Yeah” Josie’s voice was soft again and it took all of the brunette’s concentration to hear her.

“One of the other kids?”

Josie nodded once, slowly, but didn’t say anything as she continued to trace the lines in her mother’s palms with her fingers.

“In class or at lunch...”

“Recess. Second recess” her words were still quiet and slow.

“Somebody from your class, or...”

“No” Josie shook her head. “A third grader.”

Ali’s brain started running through all of the third graders that she knew – mostly from interactions with Josie’s play that had kids of all elementary school ages involved. Dodge’s best friend, Mikey, had a sister in third grade too.

“What happened?”

Josie took her time, so much time in fact that Ali didn’t think she was going to say anything else, but eventually she told her mother about Franny Higgins teasing her about her birthmark, calling her names, and then trying to push her off of the monkey bars. She didn’t go into a lot of detail. She stated the facts as if she was describing what she had seen on a video or tv show. Ali felt her own heartrate increase as her blood began to boil. What kind of piece of shit kid did that to other kids?! Josie wouldn’t tell her who the 3rd grader was though, and that made the brunette even more angry. She wasn’t upset with Josie, she thought it was more than a little ironic that the child of theirs that tattled the most had somehow decided not to spill the beans when it was finally acceptable to do so.

“I’m so sorry that happened honey” Ali wrapped her arms around her daughter’s small body and squeezed her tightly to her chest. She kissed the side of her head and then squeezed her again, happy to feel Josie’s hands returning the squeeze on her arms. “That’s really awful and you shouldn’t have to deal with that Jose. I’m angry that the teachers let that happen to you” she offered honestly. “And I want you to tell me the girl’s name so I can talk to her parents about it and make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

“No” Josie shook her head. “I don’t want you to.”

“Why not? Don’t you want her to be nicer to you?”

“Yeah, but she’ll just get mad.”

“And then it might get worse for you at school with her? Is that what you think?”

Josie nodded again and then squirmed so Ali would release her tight squeeze. The girl turned herself over, making her mother groan and wince at her bony elbow in her breast, so they were hugging chest to chest with Josie straddling the brunette’s lap. The redhead wrapped her arms around Ali’s shoulders and tucked her head into her neck while the brunette returned her own arms to the tight squeeze again.

“Were you scared she was going to hurt you?”

Josie nodded and moved one hand up to play with her mother’s dark hair on her shoulder.

“Were you mad at her for teasing you and calling you names?”

Josie nodded again.

“Well, I’m very proud of you.”

“You are?”

“Of course I am, little one” Ali kissed her forehead again and patted her bum a couple of times. “You kept your cool and didn’t push her or hit her, first of all. That’s really hard to do, so good job. Second of all, you almost made it all the way across the monkey bars...”

“I only had two left” Josie interrupted, excited by the memory that had been dimmed by the other crap that had surrounded it.

“Only two left? That’s so great Jose. Good for you sweetheart” Ali lifted Josie’s hand up victoriously and then they both flexed and giggled.

It might have seemed like nothing to most people, but Ali knew how her daughter struggled with physical things like the monkey bars. She also knew how much it ticked the girl off that her younger sister could do the monkey bars just as well as she could. That was a big motivator for Josie and Ali knew that she would have been the same way if she had been in Josie’s shoes. Having your kid sister be the same size as you was not a great feeling. Luckily for Josie, Lily wasn’t a competitive threat like Dodge was for Drew. But Lily, in her own way, pushed Josie to be stronger and work harder and climb farther every single day.

“Mommy?”

“Yes love?”

“Why did she do that to me?” Josie’s voice wasn’t whiny or weak, just curious.

“I don’t know” Ali shook her head as she tried to find the words to explain that some people on the planet just sucked sometimes. “You know how you felt tonight at practice, after the ball hit you?”

“Yeah?”

“You were upset and in pain and probably angry and a little embarrassed too, right?”

“Ah-huh” she nodded against Ali’s chest. “All of them.” 

“Well, maybe this girl, whoever she is, was feeling like that today for some reason we don’t know. And maybe she thought the only way to make herself feel better was to make somebody else feel just as bad as she did.”

“Really?”

“I don’t know for sure honey. Nobody will know until we ask her about it and talk to her. She might need somebody to talk to too.”

“Doesn’t she have a mommy to talk to?”

“I don’t know” Ali shrugged. “But hopefully Mrs. Wilson can talk to her and find out why she’s so angry and mean. She can’t be very happy if that’s how she goes around school treating other kids. Does she seem happy?”

“Umm, I don’t think so. But she laughs a lot about it. When...when she teases me.”

They were quiet again for another minute and Ali knew their time was limited because she could hear Drew’s footsteps coming down the front stairs. 

“Did anybody help you when this girl was being mean to you?”

“Kayla stayed with me. And Mrs. Wilson came over and said recess was over but the bell didn’t ring yet.”

“I’m glad she did that” the brunette kept rubbing her girl’s back and playing with her thin, straight hair. “And I’m glad Kayla was there for you too.”

“She tried to hold me up so I wouldn’t fall.”

“That’s a good friend to have” Ali smiled at the thought. 

“She’s my best friend.”

“What about James? I thought he was your best friend?”

“No, well, he’s my best best friend. And she’s my best friend at school.”

“Ah, gotcha. That makes sense” Ali nodded and smiled again. She waited a beat, not wanting the sweet time with Josie to come to an end. “Do you want to take a shower now or do you want to get up early tomorrow morning and take one with me?”

“With you. In the morning.”

“Alright then, let’s get upstairs and get into jammies so we don’t miss storytime.”

“Mommy?”

“MmmHmm?” Ali answered, neither of them having made any attempt to move yet.

“Can I wash my own hair?”

“We’ll see baby, we’ll see.”


	3. Ashlyn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Smut warning at the end of the chapter...

Wednesday morning was a mess and Ashlyn didn’t have time to clean it all up. She had a bunch of things on her schedule that day and spending an extra hour putting the house back together was not one of them. Fitting Josie’s shower into the morning routine had not gone as smoothly as Ali wanted and they had all paid the price. Lily had been upset because she hadn’t gotten to shower with mommy in the master bathroom shower even though she freely admitted that she wouldn’t have woken up early to do it in the first place. She was just in the mood to be contrary, so she was. Dodge, on the other hand, woke up at 6:30am like he usually did and decided to join Ali and Josie in the shower without being invited. If they weren’t so pressed for time it would have been really cute and pretty funny. But Ali and Josie were just about to get out and now the brunette had to quickly finish showering Dodge because the first thing he did was dump a ton of Ashlyn’s shampoo onto his head.

“What’s going on in here?” the keeper asked groggily at 6:35am when she heard the commotion in the master bathroom. “Wow. That’s not what I expected” she chuckled as she rubbed her sleepy eyes and yawned.

“Can you take her?” Ali’s aggravated voice came from inside the shower as she hastily worked to get their son shampoo-free.

“Here little one, here’s your towel” Ashlyn knelt down on the plush bath mat between the shower and the door to the bathroom and began drying Josie off.

“Mama, you have crazy bed head” Josie giggled as she attempted to pat down the parts of Ashlyn’s hair that were sticking up and out at strange, severe angles.

“Of course I do” she smiled at the girl before covering her whole head with the towel to start getting her hair dry. “It’s 6:30 in the morning and there’s some kind of shower party going on in my bathroom. I think I’m dressed appropriately, and that includes my hair.”

“You’re silly” Josie grinned when her face appeared again, free of the towel. She grimaced when her fat upper lip hit her teeth, but then managed a half-smile again.

“And you’re sweet” the keeper pulled her daughter into a hug and finished drying her body off, admiring how she didn’t burst into tears at her painful lip. She was pretty sure both Drew and Lily wouldn’t have been half as tough about it.

“And we’re late as heck” Ali added as she shut the water off. “Can you take him too?”

“Nope” she made a face and shook her head. “I think Dodger’s just gonna have to go to school today naked and wet” she shrugged and tried to keep a straight face as both Josie’s and Dodge’s faces registered shock.

“Can I?” Dodge asked, idly holding his penis, bouncing on his toes and grinning from ear to ear.

“No you can’t” Ali gave her wife a ‘what the fuck are you thinking?’ look as she stepped around the kids to get to her own towel.

Ashlyn knew she was right, of course. Dodge would be the one kid of theirs who would go to school and take his clothes off and tell his teacher that his mama said he could.

“No bud, I’m only kidding” the keeper winked at him. “Come on, let’s get you dried off and then dressed before we even have to wake up your brother and sister. Think we can do it?”

“Yeah!” he jumped into her arms with one of his tackle hugs and almost knocked her over backwards from the force.

“Me too! I wanna do it too!” Josie dropped her towel and ran out of the master bathroom, through the master bedroom and into the second-floor hall.

“Shhhhhhh!!!!” Ashlyn shushed them both. “The first rule of the game is to be quiet and not wake them up.”

She chuckled and stood up as Dodge followed his sister two minutes later and mostly dry, desperate to get dressed first. She stretched her back and then yawned again as she sat on the toilet to pee.

“Sorry we woke you up” Ali said in a breathy voice as she hustled to dry herself off and try and make up about 20 minutes of time she had lost with the shower shenanigans.

She and Ashlyn had talked the night before about Josie’s ‘run-in’ and the brunette planned to talk to Mrs. Wilson about it that morning before school. But that wasn’t going to happen now because there was no way they were going to get to school early. The keeper flushed the toilet and washed her hands and started brushing her teeth, all the while admiring her wife’s beautiful body. 

“I don’t mind waking up to this view” she cheesed with her mouth full of toothpaste and a lopsided grin on her face.

She loved watching Ali like that, moving swiftly and efficiently, her arms and legs stretching and flexing with each reach and step. By the time she had finished brushing her teeth, Ali had finished combing her hair out and moisturizing her body and was about to leave the bathroom to get dressed. Ashlyn reached out with one of her long arms and pulled their bodies together in a close embrace.

“Babe, I’m so late...” Ali groaned but couldn’t resist the feel of her wife’s warm hands all over her back.

“Good morning beautiful” the keeper smiled sweetly and kissed her lips softly but purposefully.

“Mmmmm” Ali replied as she gave in and hugged and kissed her keeper back. “Morning” she smiled as they pulled apart.

“Mama! I’m done!” Dodge announced loudly as he skidded into the master bathroom, slightly out of breath. He was totally unfazed by the embrace or his mommy’s nakedness. They didn’t make a big deal out of it so he didn’t either. It was just what parents did sometimes in the chaos that was the morning routine.

Ashlyn and Ali both turned their heads to look at the intruder, smiling at the adorable boy who was indeed dressed. He still had his socks in his hand and his shirt was on inside out, but he was dressed.

“Looking good buddy” Ali tousled the hair on his head as she walked by him and out of the bathroom. “I’ve gotta get dressed or we’ll never make it out of here on time.”

Ashlyn watched her favorite sight in the world with a dreamy sigh as Ali’s ass walked away from her at a quick pace, and then she turned her attention to her excited son. She helped him put his shirt on correctly and then squatted down in front of him with a serious look on her face.

“Tell me one thing...are you wearing underwear?”

As soon as Ali backed the minivan full of kids out of the driveway, Ashlyn brought all of the breakfast dishes from the nook table to the kitchen sink. She made herself some avocado toast and another cup of coffee and sat down at the small kitchen table to enjoy them and check her email on her phone. Fifteen minutes later she changed into workout clothes, grabbed her water bottle and headed down to the basement gym for an hour. She didn’t really have time for a full hour workout that morning, but she couldn’t remember the last time she had done it so she made time for it. She typically spent a half hour in the basement gym and kept pushing off the full hour workout for ‘when she had more time’. Which, of course, never happened. Anytime Ashlyn felt sorry for herself for being a mom who worked mostly from home, she reminded herself that she could do things like workout whenever the hell she wanted to and that took care of that problem. She knew she was lucky and usually had things in good perspective. She had no right to complain about anything and she knew it.

By 10:30am she was showered, dressed and sitting at her desk in the office above the garage. She made a dozen phone calls to potential donors for both the MHI and the Academy, and replied to all of her work emails. She texted Whitney and Ali four hysterical gifs and made plans with Niki to go to the next Boston Pride home game that weekend. Things were very good for Ashlyn Harris – soccer commentator and sports personality. Ashlyn Krieger would trade Ashlyn Harris away in a heartbeat if she had to get rid of one of her personas, but luckily she could be both versions of herself and flourish at both of them. The secret to a great deal of her success was sitting at her own desk at Knight-Harris in Cambridge, MA. Ali was really good at her job and had continued to promote her wife in several different sectors of the business, entertainment and sports worlds. She only repped one athlete, her wife, but she repped the hell out of her. The Dunkin Donuts deal had been a huge success, making both Ashlyn and Kamala Pierce, K-H’s all-star WNBA client, household names all across New England. Nike had continued their support, signing the keeper turned commentator and celebrity for another multi-year contract. She didn’t get the splashy new ad campaign as she had in the past, but most athletic companies weren’t featuring 43-year old former athletes that way either. Ashlyn didn’t take it personally. She was happy to stay with Nike and continue their partnership. It had been a lucrative deal for both parties and there was no reason to expect that to change in the near future.

Suburu had finished running the minivan commercials and ads after the 3-year contract ended in 2026. Ashlyn continued to represent the company and make lots of social media posts about how Suburu helped she and her family get things done day in and day out. Suburu hadn’t had an ad campaign as effective as Ashlyn’s minivan commercials since then and they were eager to replicate the magic. They were planning to start filming Ashlyn and all four kids and both dogs in a new commercial for their latest and greatest minivan later that month. The plan was to film them doing their regular activities, like skiing and snowboarding in New Hampshire in January, and going to school events and spring sports in April, and hitting the beach and going to Breakers games in July, and enjoying the Fall foliage in October. Four different commercials in all. Ali had the same reservations and insisted on the same restrictions as she had last time. Only partial shots of the kids. They were just going to be background for the ads, getting into and out of the vehicle again and maybe some close-ups, unidentifiable hands or feet of course, of how they used the bells and whistles the minivan had to offer. Ashlyn agreed and Suburu set out to craft commercials that worked for them while still obeying Ashlyn’s rules.

The big new sponsorship that Ali had negotiated for her keeper was with American Express. It was one of the oldest and most prestigious credit cards in the world and they didn’t ask just anybody to represent their brand and image. But, as so many companies had realized before them, American Express had decided that the alternative lifestyle dollars were just as important to them as the traditional or conventional ones. Ashlyn straddled the line of conventional family woman and alternative rebel and she had tested through the roof with American Express’ new target audiences. Once the mainstream companies understood that the LGBTQ populations were buying and spending just as much as, if not more than, the straight folks, famous people like Ashlyn became more popular and desirable. The keeper was scheduled to go to LA and film her American Express ads at the end of February and she was nervous and excited about it. If the ads were successful Ashlyn could be at the beginning of a long and lucrative association with the venerable company.

She still worked with the NWSL and emceed the draft every January. She would be heading to Portland in exactly one week to do just that for the 2029 draft. And she still covered as many USWNT games and events as her schedule allowed, including the biggest tournaments in the world. She had every reason to believe that she would be asked to help cover the Women’s World Cup in 2031 and the Olympics in 2032 and she had every intention of saying yes to both events. She had loved doing the EUROs back in 2025 and she was going to participate in this summer’s tournament as well. It was being held in Israel but she had told the producers that she couldn’t be away from home for 3 weeks anymore with the kids’ busy schedules. Last year’s trip to France for the 2028 Olympics had been a wonderful experience for the whole family, but she and Ali had agreed that it had been so much work and stress and expense that they weren’t sure if they would do it again. Maybe once the kids were older it would be easier to manage. But until then, Ashlyn would try to cover those big worldwide soccer tournaments remotely, if the broadcast partners would let her. Covering those events was one of Ashlyn’s favorite things to do and she would be crushed if she didn’t get to do it anymore, but she had to put her family first. It was a commitment she and Ali had both made when they started having babies in the first place. So far, they had been remarkably lucky that the networks had been so accommodating to Ashlyn’s schedule. They hoped it would continue but if not then the keeper would have some tough decisions to make. 

Ashlyn remained on the board of directors for TWLOHA, working with her friend Jamie Tworkowski as always. He continued as a board member for The Academy as well. And she still was active in the Breastfeeding Group that had pursued her after the famous picture of her breastfeeding Lily during a break covering the 2023 WWC from her garage. She wrote the occasional editorial or column for their website and put her interviewing skills to good use on famous new members of the organization and other influential people who were fighting for breastfeeding rights around the world. Similarly, the women’s group she had joined around the same time with high-profile members like Melinda Gates, Oprah Winfrey and Chelsea Clinton, was still flourishing and making a difference in the world for all women. Ashlyn did the same things that she did for the breastfeeding organization – conducted interviews, posted opinion pieces that focused on the role athletics played in young girls’ and women’s lives, and shared her own stories and experiences as an athlete, businesswoman, wife, and mother. 

Ashlyn also continued to serve on the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition. President Elizabeth Warren had appointed her back in January of 2021, her first year in office, and the keeper had served on the council for all 8 years of her presidency. When the new republican president had been elected in November last year, he had kept the Council in place and only switched out a few of the twelve members. Ashlyn was happy to be one of the remaining council members, even though she was nervous about the new president of the United States. Thankfully, the country had learned its’ extremely painful lesson back in the 2016 election and the backlash against 8 years of democrat-run government had yielded a more moderate, contemporary republican candidate this time. Ashlyn hadn’t voted for him and didn’t know too many people in her world who had, but he wasn’t an extremist in any regard. The keeper, along with a lot of the country, was cautiously optimistic about the new republican president.

Ashlyn was still an ambassador for the Boston Breakers and a big, visible, vocal part of the Breakers family. As her schedule had gotten busier with MHI and Knight-Harris responsibilities over the years, the number of appearances she made for the Breakers had decreased. Instead of making one or two appearances a week at different community events during the season, she made only one a week now. Similarly, during the off-season, she had cut down from 2 appearances a month to only one. She was only one person and she only had so much time. Between working her other jobs and travelling to cover the USWNT, she had to reduce her involvement in other areas. The one thing she tried really hard never to miss were Breakers home games. Ali also felt very strongly about going to the games and did her best to schedule their lives accordingly. The 3:00pm Saturday games were the hardest because they were so busy with the kids’ activities on Saturdays. But they usually made it work, sometimes arriving to the stadium just minutes before kick-off. It wasn’t ideal, but it was the best they could do. There were several of those Saturday 3pm games when Ashlyn left whatever youth league field they were on before the last little Krieger game was done. She hated doing that but Ali had assured her that the kids would be ok if either one of them had to miss the occasional game. Ali and the kids would join her at the stadium as soon as the game was over and they would all watch the rest of the Breakers game together. 

And Ashlyn was still very involved with Knight-Harris in every way. She may not have been sitting in the Cambridge offices like Ali and Whitney and Jared, but she was just as important to the success of the business. Ashlyn was the name and the face that brought new clients to the company. She made sure to personally call and welcome every new client that signed with them. It was time-consuming but the keeper felt it was important. And Ali encouraged and supported it because she knew that was a big part of what made K-H different. The young athletes that signed with them knew without a doubt that the company gave a damn about them. There could be no question if one of the two names of the company called to personally welcome them to the family. Ashlyn had always brought that personal touch to K-H and she always would. It was an invaluable element of their success that would be impossible to duplicate or replace. 

After an hour and fifteen minutes of different work phone calls, emails, and other correspondence, Ashlyn drove into Boston for a lunch meeting with an important donor for the MHI. If everything went well at this lunch, the important donor might become the next board member and bring in a whole new group of new names and faces and checkbooks of wealthy Boston patrons. These glad-handing events were Ashlyn’s least favorite part of her job, but she knew none of the good things that the MHI was doing would be possible without the high-level donations from people like her lunch date that day. These meetings were the engine that made everything else run and it was her job to keep that engine greased up and running smoothly. 

At 12:35pm Ashlyn sat down at a table with Taylor Gervasio, who was the new Helen Siegfriedt at the MHI, and the hopefully future donor. They were dining at the toney Four Seasons Hotel restaurant in downtown Boston, right in the heart of Boston’s old money and bluest of blood. It was the type of dining room and lunch that Ashlyn would have felt impossibly out of place in not too long ago. Over the years she had gotten used to the way the ultra-rich lived so she could at least co-exist in their world for short stretches of time. When it started to get too uncomfortable for her she needed only to think about one of her young fans, maybe the teenage girl who had been the first to park herself on the porch of the big old house that time when the twins were still only a year old. Ashlyn would think of that teenager who had been feeling lost and alone and misunderstood and then she would imagine her reaching out to the MHI for help when she needed it most. The keeper would sit through as many stiff lunches and shake as many cold, rich hands as it took if it meant keeping the doors of the MHI open. It was as simple as that.

Aliebe: what do you mean you can’t get the kids?  
Ashlyn: my lunch with the big wig is going long and I won’t be able to get there by 2:30

There was a long pause before the next text came through Ashlyn’s phone as she stood in the ladies room of the fancy restaurant.

Ashlyn: should I call your dad? I’ll do whatever you need me to do, but I’ve gotta get back out there...  
Aliebe: working on it...

Ashlyn washed her hands again and smiled when someone else came into the ladies room so it didn’t look like she was hiding out in there to text her wife. Which is exactly what she was doing.

Ashlyn: I’m really sorry. Taylor told me we’d be done by 1:30 at the latest.  
Aliebe: Taylor’s there too? Where are you?  
Ashlyn: Yes. Four Seasons, downtown. They have the best deviled eggs I’ve ever had in my life. You’ll love them.  
Aliebe: I’d love it if I knew how my kids were getting home from school today. For fuck’s sake!

Ashlyn wasn’t sure if that last barb was because of the child pick-up situation or because she was having lunch with Taylor Gervasio, but either way, it stung like hell. Ali was pissed and the keeper couldn’t really blame her.

Ashlyn: Ouch.

There was another long pause and the keeper was about to bail and head back to the table before she screwed that up too. Mess up kid pick-up and turn-off the potential new donor in the same afternoon. What a monumental cluster fuck that would be.

Ashlyn: I’ve gotta get back to the table. I’m sorry honey. Thank you for cleaning up my mess. I’ll make it up to you. I love you.

Just as she was about to pull the door open she felt her phone vibrate.

Aliebe: sorry. Was on the phone with Vicki. She and dad can get the kids.  
Ashlyn: oh thank God. Thank you baby. I owe you big time. Xxooxxoo  
Aliebe: the only thing I have on the kids’ schedule is Drew’s basketball practice tonight. 6-7pm. Is that right?  
Ashlyn: Yes. That’s it. Tell your dad just to say no to any friend requests this afternoon.   
Aliebe: already did  
Ashlyn: Ok, I’ve gotta go...

There was another brief pause and the keeper let her eyes linger on the screen for another couple of hopeful seconds.

Aliebe: are you still there?  
Ashlyn: yes, but I’m walking through the door...  
Aliebe: I’m sorry I was a bitch. It’s just a busy day and we had such a crazy morning and I just...I’m sorry.  
Ashlyn: Me too.  
Aliebe: Can you sneak home one of those deviled eggs? lol  
Ashlyn: No need. You can order your own when I bring you here to make up for today. We’ll pick a date tonight. Boom.  
Aliebe: I love you. It’s a date! I’d love you even more if you brought me a deviled egg...  
Aliebe: just kidding.  
Ashlyn: Woman!  
Aliebe: lol. Get back out there and land that new board member babe. See you at home. Love you. Xx

Once lunch was over, Ashlyn returned some phone calls as she made the hour-long drive back up to Gloucester. It was 3:45pm by the time she pulled her Jeep into the driveway and parked. The afternoon and evening continued in the challenging way the day had begun and kept on going. Ashlyn hadn’t been able to go grocery shopping so they had to order in dinner, which was never as much fun as it sounded. Ken and Vicki couldn’t stay for dinner but they had been there when Ali and Ashlyn needed them most. Ashlyn had also told her wife that she would pick up the dry cleaning that day too, but that didn’t happen either. In retrospect, Ashlyn should have pushed off her workout until the next day or else made fewer work phone calls before her lunch appointment. But that was exactly the type of thing that happened if the morning routine got messed up. Josie’s shower had thrown the whole train off the tracks and they had been barreling off-course ever since. But it wasn’t Josie’s fault. She needed to talk to one of her moms about her bullying incident from school last evening. Nobody had done anything wrong, except for Franny Higgins, but this was a great example of how things steamrolled and became bigger things that wreaked havoc on the family schedule. 

Ali hadn’t been pleased about the missing dry cleaning when she got home that evening. She could have stopped herself and picked it up on her way home if Ashlyn had told her. But the keeper had totally spaced it and by the time they realized the problem, the dry cleaner was closed. In addition, Dodge had left his homework folder at school. Ken and Vicki didn’t know how vigilant they needed to be with the school stuff at kid pick-up and it was an honest mistake. But it meant that Dodge couldn’t do his homework. Ashlyn had spent an hour making phone calls to see if she could be allowed into the school to retrieve the homework folder. The simple fix was to go online and look at the homework sheet that way, which Ali did when they realized their predicament. But, of course, when they went to print the homework sheet their printer didn’t work. None of them did. The one in the office kept saying there was a network error and the portable printer they kept in the house was out of freaking ink. It was just incredible the way the day kept spiraling deeper and deeper into hell. And of course the homework sheet for that particular night was an actual sheet that they needed and couldn’t just duplicate from Lily’s homework page. Dodge physically needed his own sheet, which was different than Lily’s, so he could cut and paste onto it according to the homework instructions. 

Assistant Coach Ashlyn and Drew went to basketball practice from 6-7pm and stopped at Staples with Dodge’s homework page copied onto a thumb drive that they printed at the store on their way home afterwards. Piece of cake. Not. It was right about that time that Ali realized the dry cleaning was missing too. It was a bumpy evening for all concerned and both moms were tense and annoyed in general. By the time they got the kids put to bed that night, thirty minutes later than usual, Ali had announced that she was going up to take a bath and calm down. That left Ashlyn to clean up the kitchen which was still a disaster from breakfast. The keeper felt it was more than fair though, considering the dry cleaning snafu and everything else that had seemingly gone wrong on her watch. It was just one of those days and both moms knew enough to do their best and roll with the punches and take whatever space they needed to keep from lashing out at one another. What Ashlyn didn’t know was that Ali wasn’t really taking a bath upstairs.

“Well what’s all this?” Ashlyn asked, eyebrows raised as she walked into the bedroom from the backstairs.

“Aw, you’re not supposed to be up here this fast” Ali pouted and turned to face her wife from the foot of the bed. “I’m not ready...”

As excited as the keeper was about seeing her beautiful brunette dressed in her sexy robe and lighting candles around the bedroom, she was even more touched to see the look of adorable disappointment on her face. The fact that Ali had gone to all of that trouble and was genuinely crestfallen that she hadn’t been able to complete the set-up, on a night when neither of their days had gone well or according to plan, meant everything to Ashlyn. She felt bad for ruining the surprise, but there was no way she was leaving the room. Instead of rose petals on the floor, which they had both done plenty of over the years and would surely do again in the future, Ali had run around the house gathering up all of the sea shells they had collected in the 14 years that Ashlyn had lived there and then spread them around the floor instead. Her girl loved the ocean and the beach more than anything and it was January in New England and cold as fuck outside – so Ali wanted to bring the beach indoors for Ashlyn that night. The brunette had never been more thankful for Lily’s collecting habit in her life. She had found about 20 different shells in Lily’s shoebox, and with the other 40 or so from the other kids’ shoeboxes, Ali had more than enough to roughly outline both sides of a path from the backstairs to the bathroom and around the foot of the bed. There were shells on the nightstands and the dressing table and the low dresser near the foot of the bed. She had brought up some of their beach towels, not the kid-themed ones, not that night, no thank you, and draped them over the headboard of the bed and across the back of the dressing table chair and over the tv at the foot of the bed to help set the scene. 

“Honey, you didn’t have to do all of this” the keeper cocked her head to the side just a bit and smiled sweetly at her wife. “After the day we had, and the way I fucked it up, I’m lucky you even let me in here with you tonight” she chuckled and rolled her eyes with another grin. “You’re too good to me Al. I should be doing this for you...”

“Shhhh...” Ali shook her head as she knelt on the foot of the bed, her short, almost-sheer, floral patterned silk robe just hitting the top of the comforter at her knees. “No, I was a jerk this afternoon and tonight and I’m really sorry about that Ash. I know how hard you work” she walked on her knees towards Ashlyn’s side of the bed, facing the blonde who was standing next to it. “And I know how hard it is for you to get into the city and to your other meetings. It’s almost impossible” she sighed and looked down, feeling guilty and selfish again. “You’re always here to get the kids, always. I don’t really know how you do it” she chuckled softly. “Really – it’s shocking that stuff like today doesn’t happen every week. You’re amazing, babe. And I’m the luckiest wife in the world.”

She stretched both arms out and wiggled her fingers for Ashlyn to step closer and give her a hug, the brunette’s face covered in a sad, guilty frown. The keeper leaned her thighs against the side of the bed and pulled Ali into a huge hug. They didn’t talk or do anything for two full minutes but hold onto each other, chins on each other’s shoulders, and breathe. 

“So are you saying I’ve been doing this wrong all along?” Ashlyn asked softly as she turned her head to kiss Ali’s cheek.

“What do you mean?” Ali asked, just as softly, as she nuzzled into her keeper’s lips.

“Usually when I fuck up I’m the one making the grand gesture to apologize and remind you why you love me and keep me around” she explained, kissing her wife’s cheek again and mumbling the words with her lips still on her skin. “But apparently I should have held out all along because, even though you say you’re not good at them, this is quite the grand gesture going on here baby” she giggled and made Ali giggle at the ticklish sensation against her cheek.

“Listen” the brunette pulled her head back and put both of her hands on Ashlyn’s face to make sure she was paying complete attention. Her voice was steady and her face was full of love as she spoke. “You always get my worst and you probably always will. And I hate that. I get it, that’s what happens. We take things out on the one we love the most. But I hate it. You were great today honey and I was a bitch and took a cheap shot just because I was having a shitty day. Like you weren’t stressed out enough about the situation already.” She dropped her eyes and shook her head, disappointed in her behavior when she and Ashlyn had been texting earlier and she had snapped at her keeper. “I know how awesome you are and I just wanted to tell you...to show you...” she glanced around the room, “how much I appreciate everything you do for me and the kids every single damned day. I love you so much Ashlyn” her voice broke as she got to the end of her sentence.

The keeper couldn’t find any words to say in that moment. Her head and her heart were both swimming in powerful emotions as she gazed at her beautiful wife, pouring her heart out to her on their imaginary beach. It was moments like that where Ashlyn really truly felt the depth and breadth of Ali’s love for her. There was no way for her to doubt it, even just a little bit like she did sometimes when her self-confidence was slightly lower than usual. Ashlyn would contend to the day she died that she had married up and that Ali had settled for her. Her heart knew it was bullshit, but her brain sometimes messed with her and told her dumb things. But then Ali would rescue her from herself, like always, and prove her love over and over and over again. She could convince Ashlyn even when her brain was fucking with her that there was no-one else on the planet that she wanted to be with. Ali always found a way to remind her that she was the only person who would ever make her way into the brunette’s heart. Instead of words, Ashlyn thanked her wife for her devotion with one of the most passionate, romantic kisses they had ever shared.

“Wow” Ali breathed out when they broke for air, her eyes still closed.

“That’s what I was going for” Ashlyn exhaled as she caught her breath and leaned her forehead against her wife’s. “I love you too. More than I can even understand sometimes. Thank you for being with me and doing life with me Al. I’m the lucky wife.”

The weight of the emotions got to them both and they cried soft tears as they embraced again. They were happy tears that left them giggling after a few minutes.

“What a mess we are” Ali chuckled as she leaned back again and wiped the tears off of her keeper’s beautiful, flushed face. “So much for my romantic, sexy surprise” she laughed. “I don’t care. This was almost better anyway” she said, referring to the deep emotional connection they were enjoying. She grinned and gave Ashlyn a soft kiss.

“So, just to be clear...you know, in case something like this happens again” Ashlyn smirked a little as she used the back of her long fingers to brush the tears off of her wife’s smiling face. “You did all this, which is awesome by the way – I’m totally digging the beach theme” the keeper nodded at the beach towels on the headboard. “You did all this because you realized how awesome I am...” she paused and watched Ali playfully roll her eyes at her, “or was it because you found out Taylor was at my lunch today?”

She prepared herself for the swat she was going to get and Ali didn’t let her down. The brunette smacked Ashlyn’s arm and gasped at the suggestion. But she couldn’t keep a straight face for very long because her keeper was absolutely right and they both knew it.

“Don’t tease me about that” she entreated shyly, ducking her head down while Ashlyn pulled them close together again. “I hate how jealous I get. It’s so lame and pathetic...”

“And it makes me feel like I won the lottery” Ashlyn finished, her voice quiet and surprisingly serious all of a sudden. 

Ali heard the change too and lifted her eyes to study her wife’s sheepish face. She tilted her head and furrowed her brow as she cupped her keeper’s cheek.

“What are you talking about honey?” the brunette’s voice was soft, concerned and comforting.

“Oh, hell” Ashlyn sighed loudly and closed her eyes, unable to look into that sweet face for a few seconds. She felt silly admitting this to her wife and she knew Ali would chastise her for feeling the way she did sometimes. “I like when you get jealous because...ummm...”

Ali leaned forward and kissed her again. It was so sweet and tender that it made Ashlyn open her eyes to see for sure what had just left such a wonderful, loving sensation on her lips.

“Tell me” she asked quietly as she continued to caress her keeper’s cheek with her fingertips.

“Well, it’s flattering as hell” Ashlyn confessed, blushing just a bit. “It makes me feel like you’re still attracted to me, like you still want me.”

Ali’s eyes opened wide in surprise when she heard the words that had just come out of her wife’s mouth. She felt an overwhelming wave of guilt sweep over her. How shitty of a wife was she if Ashlyn was doubting that she was still attracted to her?

“Ash, babe, you don’t really doubt that, do you?” she asked, her voice wavering a bit. “Please tell me you don’t doubt that. For Christ’s fucking sake” she closed her eyes and tried to calm herself down and stop beating herself up. She sat back on her heels with her hands in her lap, separating their bodies.

“No, no, no...” the keeper realized quickly what was going on. “It’s not you baby, I swear. It’s just something in my head that fucks me up sometimes...” she tried to explain something that she barely had an understanding of herself.

“How often does it fuck you up? What does that mean?” Ali lifted her sad eyes to meet her wife’s anxious ones.

“Ugh, Al, trust me, this is not a thing. I swear to God. Please believe me.”

“Then why did you say it?”

“Because it’s true, but it’s one of my deep, dark, dumb fears” the keeper picked up her wife’s hands in her own and brought them up to her lips and gently kissed them. “It’s all in my head and I know it. And it’s not a big thing, I promise” she tried to clarify, holding Ali’s gaze and wishing she had kept her mouth shut.

Ali studied her wife’s anxious face and chewed her bottom lip, deep in thought. She could tell Ashlyn was being honest with her, about the fear as well as the fact that it was something her own mind had created. The brunette had been a victim of her own mind’s insecurities from time to time as well.

“I get what you’re saying...” she began slowly.

“Oh thank God” Ashlyn exhaled loudly and let her head tilt back in relief as she squeezed Ali’s hands between them.

“But that’s awful honey. I don’t want you to feel like that, whether it’s in your head or not. I’m so sorry I don’t do a better job of letting you know how much I still want you...and I do, still want you. Every day, all the time” she blushed and looked down, embarrassed by the scope of her want.

“I know you do Al” the keeper moved her fingertips to Ali’s chin and gently lifted it up. “I feel it here” she brought one of the brunette’s hands to her heart and they both felt it pounding as she stood there. “That’s what I mean, my head plays tricks on me sometimes, but everything else knows things are still good” Ashlyn smiled lovingly at her wife and cupped her cheek, caressing her cheekbone with her thumb.

They stared at each other for a minute until Ali’s face had a small, shy smile on it too. They could both feel the relief starting to fill the space around them and they started to relax. Ashlyn still had her hand playing with her wife’s cheek and hair and neck, and Ali slid her hand from her keeper’s heart down to her breast and began fondling it, still covered by t-shirt and sweatshirt from basketball practice.

“Do you feel it here?” Ali flirted, her voice low and sultry as she felt Ashlyn’s whole mood shift as soon as the touching began.

“Yes ma’am, I sure do” she swallowed and pulled the brunette up so she was standing on her knees again. 

They both slowly moved their hands around each other’s arms and breasts and backs, loving the way their bodies responded.

“And how about here?” the brunette cupped Ashlyn’s crotch with her other hand, cursing the joggers in her way. “Do you feel how much I want you...here?”

The keeper sucked in a breath and closed her eyes, enjoying her wife’s hands on her body and her low, sexy fucking voice.

“Yes, baby, yesssss.”

Ali leaned in and started to kiss Ashlyn’s neck, below her ear, and worked her lips down to her collarbone and then back up again, spending an extra minute on her sweet spot behind her ear. The blonde moved her hands to Ali’s ass, almost reflexively. They always went there first until she gave them orders to go somewhere else. Ali knew they were on their way now, back on track and heading towards the destination she had planned since that evening when she had gotten home. She had been waiting all afternoon to show her hard-working wife how sorry she was and how much she loved and appreciated her. The brunette moved her hand underneath the sweatshirt and t-shirt and found Ashlyn’s breast again, trapped beneath her sports bra. She pinched the nipple between her fingers, through the thin fabric of the sports bra, and made her girl moan. She continued teasing her with her hands and torturing her with her lips and tongue on her neck and jaw and ear until the blonde couldn’t take it anymore. Ashlyn pulled their bodies tightly together, reaching up with one hand to guide her wife’s head back towards her own face. The strong pressure of their chests and hips smashed together left Ali’s hands pinned and momentarily useless but before she could complain, her keeper brought their lips together in a hungry, sloppy, desperate kiss. She pressed the back of Ali’s head into the kiss with her strong hand and held their bodies tight with her other arm firmly around her wife’s back. They kissed like that for a long time, neither wanting to separate their lips or tongues until absolutely necessary.

“Damn” Ali panted when they finally pulled back to breathe. “You keep kissing me...like that...and I’ll be...putty in your hands...Harris...” she chuckled, low in her throat as she gasped out the words.

Ashlyn knew her wife loved to kiss. Making out was one of Ali’s favorite things and it always had been. The good news was they could do that downstairs on the couch and not have to worry about scarring somebody for life if they got walked in on. The bad news was they didn’t always take the time to kiss as much as either of them would have liked. Slow kissing and making out had taken a hit just as leisurely, long and drawn out lovemaking had. They were busy. And they were tired all the time. And there were always six more things that needed to be done and three more drop-offs and pick-ups that had to be made. There was always something rushing them. If it wasn’t the kids and their activities it was their own overwhelming exhaustion. They had both sworn that they would always sacrifice sleep for sex. They knew how important it was for them to stay connected in that way. Their relationship relied on it and they had proven time and again that it suffered when they didn’t make that sacrifice. But they were tired. They’d been tired for almost ten years now. There was no waking each other up for sex anymore – both women slept like the dead as soon as their heads hit the pillows and it was time for sleep. And as every mother would tell you, they somehow were still able to wake up in a split second if they heard something that sounded remotely like one of their children needing something in the night. Ali and Ashlyn joked about taking a weekend getaway and just sleeping. They joked about it so much that it wasn’t just a joke anymore but a secret dream that they shared only with each other. Ashlyn was 2 for 2 on her big, romantic kisses so far that night and it was by design. As much as Ali felt like she needed to apologize and show her keeper how loved and wanted she was, Ashlyn felt the same way. Her plan for the night, assuming she would be allowed into the bedroom and near her wife at all after the botched school pick-up and dry cleaning debacles, had been to give Ali all of the slow, sensual kisses she could take. And then give her a couple more.

“All this level...of sexy...and still so...damned smart too...” Ashlyn spoke through big breaths as she rubbed her hands all up and down Ali’s sides and back and ass, still covered by the short, thin robe. “Figured out my...master plan...” she winked and grinned so big her dimple appeared.

Ali licked the dimple, swirling the tip of her tongue around it, and then kissed it, still panting a little. She took her time undressing her keeper, giving her a deep kiss after each article of clothing had been removed and dropped to the floor. Once Ashlyn’s bare skin had started to show, Ali dragged her lips and tongue to each new area until the blonde was squirming as she stood there naked, her juices practically dripping onto the tops of her thighs.

“Fuck” she moaned as the brunette sucked one of her breasts into her talented mouth again. “When...when do I get to see what’s underneath here?” she asked breathily as she pulled up the back up the robe so it was just at the bottom of Ali’s ass.

“Whenever you want, all-star” Ali laughed, low in her throat so it sounded almost like a moan. “I didn’t get to finish setting everything up, but I think you get the idea I was going for” she mumbled against Ashlyn’s breast. 

“Beach blanket bingo, baby” the keeper chuckled as she put her hands on Ali’s ass, under the robe. “Ooooh, what do we have here?” she felt the sides of the bottoms Ali was wearing, trying to identify which lingerie set she had on.

“Don’t get too excited” the brunette cautioned. “It’s not what you think.”

Ashlyn moved her hands quickly to the front of her wife’s body, pushed her back a few inches, and pulled open the robe in one fell swoop.

“Oh!” Ali gasped, surprised by the sudden maneuver and turned on by her wife’s strength, as usual.

“Yes, beautiful...” Ashlyn grinned again as she let her eyes rake down and back up her wife’s body. “It’s perfect, and so are you. Just gorgeous” she ran her hands appreciatively over Ali’s breasts, down her sides, and across and around her stomach and hips. “You’re a fucking work of art. I love your body so much.”

Ali knew how sincere her wife was being and she loved her for it. She knew Ashlyn loved the sexy bikini she was wearing for her and that it helped shape her view a little bit too. The brunette didn’t wear bikinis very much anymore, unless she was somewhere private with her wife. They just weren’t that practical when you were at the beach with kids. Most of the other moms that they socialized with did the same thing for the same reasons. Truthfully, Ali didn’t feel that comfortable in a bikini anymore anyway. She was still in great shape and could pull one off, but her 44-year old body was a lot different now than her 31-year old body had been back when she had knocked Ashlyn’s socks off with her tiny bikinis. She just felt better in a one-piece so that’s what she wore those days. But that night in January on their imaginary beach, she wore a sexy fuchsia bikini that hugged her curves and drove her keeper crazy. She knew it for a fact when Ashlyn’s dark eyes met hers as she let the robe fall off of her shoulders onto the bed.

They were still for ten seconds, just staring lustfully at each other. Their lips were pink and swollen and both pairs of eyes stared hungrily at each other while their chests rose and fell quickly as they tried to remember to breathe. Ali backed up on her knees about a foot and spread her legs out wide, as she sat back on her heels again. She ran her own hands all over her own body, cupping her breasts and her crotch and then slowly caressing her thighs and her hips.

“I’ve been thinking about this since my shower this morning” the brunette flirted again in her low, lusty voice.

“Me too” the keeper husked out, her voice sounding foreign to both of them it was so turned on and ready.

“I was supposed to do a dance to a surfing song...” Ali started to explain, hoping to take the theme up another notch, but she never got to finish.

Ashlyn’s mind short-circuited and all of her control impulses shut down as she was trying to tell herself to take it easy and go slow. To act like she’d been here before instead of like a horny teenager getting her first look at the prettiest girl in school in her underwear. Her libido took over, directing her body with only one goal in mind. Fuck. Ali. Krieger. Until. She. Forgets. Her. Own. Name.

The keeper swiftly joined her wife on the bed, sliding one knee in between her legs and putting both of her large hands on her bikini-clad breasts. She pushed Ali backwards and kissed her again, hard. The brunette straightened her legs out and then bent them up at the knee as she fell onto her back with her keeper on top of her. Ali reached down with one hand and held onto the back of her wife’s thigh that was between her legs. She held it tightly to her core and started grinding against it, thankful that the bikini was there to provide some friction. Ali was so wet that she would have just slid up and down Ashlyn’s strong thigh otherwise. The brunette moved her other hand between their bodies and palmed her wife’s breast, squeezing it and pinching the nipple until it started to harden for her. 

“Jesus, shit that feels good” Ashlyn gasped into her wife’s ear as her mouth travelled along Ali’s jaw and up her neck. “Mmmmmm...”

The keeper pushed the bikini top up above Ali’s small breasts so she could feel them, skin on skin. They felt amazing in her hands and she made sure to massage and squeeze every inch of the soft flesh while she tugged her nipples to stiff points.

“Mmmmm, fuck babe...so good” Ali groaned and arched her back as her eyes closed.

“God, I want to fuck you so bad...” Ashlyn moaned against the brunette’s pulse point, biting down and then licking the skin to soothe it.

“Yessssss...I want you. I want to feel you on me” Ali grunted. She loved the weight of her keeper on top of her and wanted her to stay close so she could wrap her arms around her as they moved together. The brunette grabbed Ashlyn’s ass and maneuvered her so their legs were each against the other’s core and then pulled her down so their mounds were rubbing against each other. “Christ, I want your clit on mine. Mmmmm...fuck my clit...”

“Do you want the starfish?” Ashlyn murmured as she nibbled her way across her wife’s collar bone towards her shoulder, her hands never easing up on her nipples or breasts.

“Ooooh, yessssss...but I don’t want you to get up and get it” she whined.

“I’ll be back in two seconds...” the keeper lifted her body up, supported by her arms on either side of Ali’s head. She smiled down at her wife’s pouty face and gave her a long, slow kiss. “Don’t. Move” she instructed around two shorter kisses and then crawled off the bed on Ali’s side, the brunette’s hands clinging to her long legs until she absolutely couldn’t reach them anymore.

Ashlyn sprinted to the door to the second-floor hall and locked it, patting herself on the back for even thinking about it in that moment. Then she raced back to Ali’s closet and fumbled around in the toy box longer than she wanted to until she found the starfish toy that had been Ali’s special gift to her that Christmas. They had only used it once before but it was only January 10th. They had four kids for Christ’s sake! 

“Where are you?” Ali rolled onto her side and looked up towards her closet with another whimper. Her arms stretched out towards the edge of the bed so she could touch the love of her life again as soon as possible. “Don’t you dare wash it, it’s clean” she chastised when she saw her keeper starting to walk towards the foot of the bed on her way to the bathroom.

“Ok, ok” Ashlyn chuckled and changed course, climbing back onto the bed and smirking at her wife. She knew she was right. They always washed everything before putting it back into the toy box anyway. They just liked to be extra careful, when there was time, of course. “This is your scene my queen.” 

“That’s right” Ali sat up and lifted her bikini top over her head because the knot at the back was too tight to get undone after Ashlyn had stretched it to lift it over the brunette’s breasts. “Now get your beautiful butt back over here and get on top of me. I need you so bad Ashlyn...” her voice got lower and lower with each word.

Ashlyn swallowed hard as she watched her beautiful brunette take off her bikini bottoms, move one of the bed pillows under her butt and spread her legs out wide, preparing for the keeper. Her mound with its short, dark curls was up and she reached down with one hand and spread her lips open, exposing her pink, aching clit.

“Oh God, I’m so wet for you babe. You always make me fucking soaked” Ali moaned as she let her fingers slip back down to her folds again.

“Fuck Al” the keeper hurried into position, feeling dizzy at how turned on she was by her wife’s sexy display.

“Yes, please” Ali chuckled at the lust-filled look on her wife’s face. “Gimme that.”

The starfish wasn’t the real name of the toy but it sort of looked like a starfish so that’s what they called it. It was a vibrator, a clitoral stimulator technically, but it was flat and shaped like a starfish but with shorter stubbier arms. It was about an inch thick and 3” in diameter with the arms extending another inch to help keep it in place while you were using it. It was made of soft gel-like rubber with a flat vibrating disc inside the center of it. It was designed specifically for lesbians so they could grind against each other and both enjoy delicious sensations to their clits. There were only three speeds on the remote and the toy was a little thicker than anybody really wanted it to be, but lesbians everywhere knew that improvements would be made to it soon enough. It had made all the top toy lists at the end of last year and Ali had been lucky to find one.

The brunette glided her fingers through her drenched pussy lips again and coated both sides of the starfish with her sweet juices. She shifted her hips and hummed in anticipation as she placed the toy on top of her mound and sighed when she felt the slight weight on her clit. Ashlyn had her own hand between her own legs, making sure her lips were nice and open too. She squeezed her clit gently and hissed at the sensation.

“Hey, get over here with all of that” Ali pulled at her wife’s hip and arm to hurry her along. “Fuck, you’re gorgeous babe. So fucking hot. Mmmmmm...” she pressed down on the starfish and moaned.

Ashlyn got into a basic scissoring position, straddling Ali’s mound at an angle so her right leg was between the brunette’s legs and her left leg was on the outside of Ali’s right leg and side. The keeper let her whole vulva rest down on top of the starfish, loving the way both she and her wife moaned at the contact. Ashlyn put her right hand on Ali’s left knee that was bent up next to her and pulled it in to her body, pressing it up against her right breast and bending her head to nibble on it. Ali put her right hand on Ashlyn’s left hip and then slid it down to her ass and ran it up and down her long, strong thigh as it rested against her side. That left each of their left hands free to roam and explore. For the time being, Ali used her free hand to tug on her own nipple as she stared lustfully up at her sexy wife. Ashlyn shifted her weight a little bit and took another few seconds to adjust herself on top of the starfish, holding her breath in an attempt to try and stay in control of her skyrocketing desire. She felt like she could come before they even turned on the vibration feature.

“I’m losing my mind already” the keeper exhaled as she palmed her wife’s stomach with her big left hand. She applied light pressure to Ali’s skin with her fingertips and then slid her hand over to play with the wave tattoo on Ali’s sweet spot just inside her left hip. 

“Jesus...” Ali moaned, arched her back and sucked in a sharp breath. “Babe, please...”

“You’ve got the remote” Ashlyn smirked again as she bent over and kissed her wife passionately, roughly pushing her tongue into her mouth and surprising her.

Ali pulled her keeper down against her body and squeezed hard as they moaned loudly through the kiss. She involuntarily jerked her hips up as she got more and more turned on. Ashlyn ground down and they were soon enjoying firm pressure on their clits while they made out. They kept that up for another ten minutes until Ashlyn had forgotten about anything other than her wife’s luscious lips and the intoxicating moans and mewls and pants that were emanating from within them. The brunette reached up near her head and grabbed the remote, turning it on to the lowest vibrating setting and then dropping it back onto the bed with a satisfied squeal.

“Oh my God...”

“Jesus fucking Christ that’s good” Ashlyn breathed out, her mouth gaping as she pressed her forehead into the bed just above her wife’s left shoulder. She let her lips find the top of Ali’s shoulder and placed sloppy wet kisses there as she tried to catch her breath and steady herself. “Holy shit, I love this starfish.”

“You’re welcome” the brunette grabbed a fistful of short, light brown hair at the back of Ashlyn’s head and pulled her into another searing kiss.

They kept slowly rocking their mounds against the vibrating toy while their breasts moved together, rock hard nipples dragging past each other and sending jolts of excitement and pleasure through their bodies. Ashlyn sucked the tender skin at her wife’s neck and barely stopped in time before leaving a hickey. Ali would kill her if she marked her up someplace so visible. They continued grinding and panting and groaning through sloppy, sexy kisses and touches. Ashlyn was making her wife lightheaded with what she was doing to her breast with her long, strong fingers. And Ali had nearly broken the skin on her keeper’s ass cheek as she had it in a stranglehold, trying desperately to get their bodies even closer. Ashlyn reached blindly above their heads for the remote, pushing the button once more and causing the starfish to begin pulsing in a slower but stronger rhythm. Ali took advantage of the slight change in her wife’s upper body position and latched her lips onto her neck as the new pulsing sensation ratcheted things up another level. The keeper settled back into place and allowed the brunette to continue working on her throat and neck. She whined softly as Ali’s tongue teased her favorite spot behind her ear. 

“Don’t” she pulled her head and neck back an inch, her eyes still closed, enjoying what her wife was doing. “Stay away from my ears...I don’t wanna come yet” she explained breathlessly. “I wanna...come...with you – at the same time.”

Ali loved that about her wife. They both enjoyed lots of things about sex but Ashlyn’s favorite thing above all else was when they came at the same time. The mutual orgasm was always her ideal goal, even though it didn’t happen very often. It had been the root cause of the keeper’s ongoing quest to find a double-sided dildo that could help them achieve that goal, although the search had slowed down after she found the u-shaped, flexible, vibrating double-sided dildo that had brought them so much pleasure for the past two years. Truthfully, Ali couldn’t have cared less who came when. She didn’t mind having separate orgasms because she still had a hard time concentrating on anything else when her gorgeous keeper was trying to get her off. But she admired the hell out of Ashlyn for trying so hard to make it happen for them. It was truly one of the sweetest things in the world and the brunette knew it. Ali relented and smiled up at her wife before pulling her lips down to kiss them again. God, she loved having Ashlyn in her arms like this, with so much of their slightly sweaty skin sliding around together. Every inch of her body was alive and pulsing along with the starfish sandwiched between them.

“I’m close” the brunette breathed out as they broke the kiss. She grazed the sensitive skin behind Ashlyn’s ear with her fingertips and then kissed her again.

“Yeah? You gonna come, just from this?” Ashlyn asked, mumbling the words into her wife’s lips and jaw as she moved the kiss towards her neck.

“MmmmHmmm...” Ali nodded and bit her bottom lip with a moan. “You make me so crazy. Fuck, yessss...” she groaned when she felt a tremor in her own leg and heard their wet pussies working together on the starfish. “God damn that’s hot. Fuck.”

Ashlyn knew her wife preferred to have something inside her, preferably pressing up into her g-spot, to go with the attention to her clit when she came. They both did, really, but Ali more so. She was surprised that the brunette was about to get off from just her clit alone. But stranger things had happened. Their emotional conversation had been its own sort of foreplay in a way and they had both been really worked up before they even got the toy involved. The keeper gave her another hazy kiss, lips almost too swollen to feel anything anymore, and grabbed the remote, pushing the button one last time and making the toy go back to vibrating again, but this time faster and stronger than the first setting.

“Jesus!” she groaned, her voice clipped.  
“Shit!” Ali yelled.

The intense new setting was almost too much for them to take but they adjusted quickly. Ashlyn could feel Ali’s legs both starting to tremble and she sat up as her own clit felt like it was about to explode. 

“Noooo, I want you here...” the brunette whimpered as the flush crept up her chest towards her neck while she tried to focus her eyes on Ashlyn in her new position.

“I’ll be back there in a minute” she grunted as she trailed both hands down Ali’s body, tugging her nipples on the way past. “I need to...come...fucking hell...this is...too good...”

Ashlyn sat upright, grinding straight down as both she and Ali thrusted their clits wildly into each other. She kept her left hand on the brunette’s breasts, alternating between them, while she used her right hand to lift Ali’s left leg straight up in the air. She pushed the quivering leg back towards Ali’s head a few inches, opening the brunette’s pussy up even more. They were both dripping wet and grinding at top speed as they chased their orgasms. Both women appreciated the view they were given – the woman they loved panting and sweating with bouncing breasts and dark, lust-filled eyes.

“Oh my God...Oh my God...Oh my...yessssssss!” Ali shouted as she felt the orgasm explode through her system.

“Fuck yes, yeah baby, fuck!” Ashlyn cried out in a strangled voice as she followed her beautiful brunette a few seconds later, Ali’s jerks and twitches providing the last bit of stimulation she needed to reach her own orgasm. “Aliiiiii!”

She collapsed back down on top of the brunette, keeping her word about returning to her arms in no time, and they shook together, rolling onto their sides and curling up together, legs intertwined and lips joined again. Ali had flung the starfish to the foot of the bed as they rolled over and Ashlyn had hit the remote to turn it off. They lay there, breathing each other in deeply and lazily moving their hands across soft, satisfied skin. 

“Wow” Ali exhaled as she traced the tattoos on her wife’s arm and side. “Yeah, that baby’s a keeper” she chuckled.

“Thanks sugarplum, I think the starfish should stay too” Ashlyn teased and laughed out loud.

“Ha ha, very funny” the brunette rolled her eyes and pressed a soft kiss into Ashlyn’s shoulder in front of her.

They were quiet for a couple of minutes as they came down and steadied their breathing again. The soft, sweet touches they gave each other felt lovely after the intense and rough connection they had just shared. They both knew there would be a round two because, although those orgasms had been good, they both still had itches that needed to be scratched deep inside. Before much longer, Ali was pushing her keeper over onto her back and sliding down her body with licks and nibbles and kisses.

“Hey now, what about my turn?” Ashlyn quipped, trying to pull her wife back up. “I thought this was my grand gesture here tonight.”

“It is” Ali smirked at her and licked a meandering line from one of the keeper’s hips to the other, stopping as she always did to love on the spiderweb on her belly. “Now just lie back and let me reward you for locking the bedroom door.”

“Oh, nice” Ashlyn chuckled. “So you caught that did you?”

“Honey, trust me,” the brunette locked eyes with her grinning wife as she lowered her head down towards her light brown short hairs. She got a whiff of Ashlyn’s passion and felt light-headed again as lust started to fill her system. “I’m not perfect and I’m tired all the time and I don’t always see everything that goes on in this house...but when you’re naked, I pay attention.”


	4. Dodge

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey gang. So, here's the deal. I'm leaving tomorrow for a work trip for a week and I won't be able to post a chapter every day. Which blows. Why did I start posting at all if I couldn't do it the way I wanted to? you may ask. The answer is because I'm a child sometimes and I didn't feel like waiting. lol. Sad, but true. I miss you guys when I'm away too and I wanted to start posting the 8 chapters.   
> So I'm going to do my best to post them all before I go. They're all written but I have to proofread and edit and all that fun stuff first. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know the plan.

Thursday morning dawned with a gentle snowfall that left everything covered by an inch of snow. The forecast was for it to snow off and on for most of the day but not accumulate more than a few inches total. Snow days and school cancellations were a dicey subject because no matter what the school superintendent decided to do, half of the parents seemed to be upset about it. The truth was, it was really difficult to predict the weather, even in 2029 with all of the technological advances the weather experts had at their disposal. There were times when a big storm was predicted and the superintendent cancelled school the evening before because the roads were expected to be a mess in the morning, only to have the storm miss its mark and drop less than an inch of snow on the city of Gloucester. Then the parents would bitch and moan about having to take a day off from work to take care of their kids, or having to make other child care arrangements for nothing. Other times, trying to be conscious of the number of missed days during the year adding on to the length of school itself come June, the superintendent kept schools open and heard complaints from parents who were worried about the safety of the buses and their children on the snowy roads. There was no easy answer. 

The Kriegers were lucky because both moms had work schedules that could be massaged pretty easily if necessary. Snow days typically meant that Ashlyn didn’t get any work done during the day, unless Ali stayed home too. When Ali stayed home they would split the day in half and each go out to the garage office for 3 or 4 hours at a time and get some work done. The snowfall that Thursday wasn’t going to be a big deal and nobody was worried about snow days or work disruptions. If the storm lingered longer than predicted and continued to develop just off the coast of Gloucester overnight, then school on Friday became a different story. It was one of those ‘wait and see’ situations that nobody enjoyed. Well, the kids enjoyed it. They would talk excitedly the night before about what they would do during their snow day off from school and then go to sleep praying and hoping for lots and lots and lots of snow.

Dodge stretched his legs and rolled onto his back as his eyes blinked open. He looked to his left, out the window next to his bed that overlooked the driveway side of the house, and smiled at the pretty snow falling so softly outside. For a second he got excited about having a snow day but then remembered his parents telling them that there would definitely be school on Thursday. He let his face fall and then pushed the Avengers comforter down his body and hopped out of bed, grabbing his favorite stuffed bear and tucking it under his arm. 

All of the Krieger kids loved stuffed animals and they each had a million of them in all different shapes and sizes. Dodge’s two favorites were his stuffed owl and his stuffed bear. The bear had been one of his first stuffed animals once he got big enough to actually hold onto them. Ali had given it to him after going out shopping with Meg who was about 13 at the time. The 3 little bears from the Disney movie ‘Brave’ had always been Ali’a favorite part of that movie. Yes, she loved Merida and the complicated relationship between she and her mom, the queen. But those three little bears who were really Merida’s triplet younger brothers, simply stole her heart. Meg was a much bigger fan of Merida and her horse, Angus, and she had never really understood what Ali meant when she said that Dodge sort of reminded her of the three brothers when they were bears. That was until she got to know Dodge a little bit better. They had been at the mall shopping for something Meg needed and they stopped at the Disney store and that had been all it had taken. Meg had taken one look at the stuffed bear from ‘Brave’ and seen exactly what Ali had been talking about. Somehow the stuffed Brave bear became Dodge’s favorite and no-one was really sure why. Ashlyn was convinced it was because Ali’s face lit up like a Christmas tree every single time she saw him with it and Dodge responded accordingly, whether he realized it or not. Regardless, it was his oldest and most favorite stuffed animal and it had already survived 3-1/2 years of hard use from the energetic boy. 

That Thursday morning he walked across his room and into the bathroom he shared with his big brother Drew, stuffed bear under his arm. The door to Drew’s room was closed and Dodge knew not to make too much noise or he would suffer the wrath of grumpy, tired siblings and frustrated, annoyed mothers in equal measure. He stood in front of the toilet and peed. Then he pulled one piece of toilet paper off the roll and dabbed the end of his penis with it, dropping it into the toilet and then walking back to his bedroom without flushing the toilet or washing his hands. When he was challenged on it by either of his moms he would defend himself by saying that he was just being quiet and they had no choice but to accept it, even though they knew, at best, it was only half true. He opened his bedroom door and went into the hall, taking two steps to his right and opening the door to the master bedroom without a sound. 

He loved being awake before everybody else and had been doing it since he started sleeping through the night his first year of life. The big old house was still and quiet and peaceful – the only other person awake was his mommy and she was either in the shower or just getting out of the shower when he made his daily snuggle visit to the big bed. If he got up at 6:30am she was out of the shower and going about her morning routine – getting dressed, putting her make-up on, drying and styling her hair. If he got up earlier, at 6:15, as he seemed to do once a week or so, she would still be in the shower. Dodge liked that scenario the best because then his decision was easy. He would walk down the narrow entry way into the room, turn left at the foot of the bed and then go over and stand in front of his Mama’s side of the bed. He would stand quietly and study her face, if it was turned to his side of the bed. Sometimes Ashlyn woke right up, sensing his presence. Other times he would lean on the edge of the bed to make it dip and move a little bit to get her attention. Every once in a while he would reach out and touch her gently on her forearm or shoulder or even cheek – it all depended on what he could reach. Whatever his method, Ashlyn would open her eyes just enough to see through them, give the boy a tired half-smile, and scooch backwards towards the middle of the bed. She would lift the covers up, inviting him to join her, and squint at the clock on the nightstand to check the time. Dodge would climb up and snuggle in close to his Mama as she lowered the covers back down and wrapped her arm around him and his stuffed bear. Sometimes he would lie on his back and hold her forearm with his free hand, and other times he would curl up like her little spoon instead, his stuffed bear the third and smallest of the spoons.

“Morning big boy” she would mumble and kiss his head before falling back asleep. 

He never went back to sleep though. He would lie there and let his thoughts run to whatever hot topic was occupying his brain. When Ali was finished with her shower and came out of the bathroom wrapped in her robe to sit at the dressing table and do her make-up she would smile at her youngest son. Loving Dodge was easy to do but difficult sometimes too. He was always into something and challenging their rules and the boundaries of common sense at the same time. But he was one of the sweetest little boys either mom had ever known. Those mornings with Dodge were so sweet and special and Ali could never resist walking over to the side of the bed to give him a good morning kiss and cup his cheek.

“Good morning sweetheart” she would kiss his forehead, whispering softly so she didn’t wake up Ashlyn. “Did you have a good sleep?”

He would nod and smile up at her with those big blue eyes of his and that adorable freaking dimple and she would feel her heart explode in her chest. Dodge would watch his mother for the next 30 minutes or so on those early days. He would watch her get ready for the day and every once in a while, if she finished early, she would scoop him up and bring him downstairs to get a head start on breakfast. Even if she didn’t finish early, sometimes Ali and Dodge would walk down the backstairs together while Ashlyn got the other kids up. It all depended on the timing of things. Some mornings Dodge didn’t stop to pee before crawling into Ashlyn’s arms. He would wait until she got up to rouse his siblings and then go use the boys’ bathroom before running down the front stairs.

Most mornings though he slept until 6:30am and Ali was already out of the shower by the time he opened the master bedroom door. Then he had to decide whether to get into bed with his Mama or to go greet his Mommy as she moved from the bathroom to her closet or dresser and back again. It was a tough decision but he usually gave Ali a quick hug and then went and got into bed with Ashlyn for 20 minutes or so. That Thursday morning though, Dodge encountered something unusual when he stepped into his parents’ bedroom. As he walked through the narrow entry way he noticed something on the floor along the foot of the bed. He bent over and picked up the seashell as he noticed a few more of them spread out as he moved towards the master bathroom. Dodge continued picking up shells and soon had more than his little arms could hold so he carefully placed his stuffed bear on the foot of the bed, making sure he didn’t fall off. He kept picking up more shells as he walked towards Ashlyn’s side of the bed where his Mama was fast asleep. He could hear Ali moving around in the bathroom but his arms were full of seashells so he couldn’t go and give her a hug yet. He thought for a minute as he stood there, waiting for his Mama to open her eyes, and then dumped all the shells on the bed, just a little bit down from where he would eventually climb in.

“What the...?” Ashlyn’s head jerked up at the confusing sound of the shells clacking together that coincided with the bed dipping just a little bit.

The keeper had been sleeping on her back with her head facing the center of the bed and she groaned when she rubbed her eyes to try and make them work better. Before she could even get them all the way open she heard her son’s helpful voice.

“I picked up all the shells for you Mama” he beamed, still not quite at his fully awake self yet either. Dodge in these early morning episodes was only functioning at about a 7 out of his normal 10. 

Ashlyn’s heart stopped for a second as her mind raced to process his words. The shells...from last night...fuck!...what the hell else had they left out?!

“Thanks Dodger” she croaked out, sitting up and glancing nervously around the rest of the room.

“Why are they on the floor?” he asked, tilting his head to the side and wondering why he hadn’t been invited into the big bed yet. He sidled up to his left a bit and leaned on the edge of the bed in front of Ashlyn to prod the process along.

At that moment, Ali came out of the bathroom in her fluffy fuchsia robe and combed-out, wet hair and stopped when she saw her son. Her eyes went wide when she took in the seashell collection on the bed, and she quickly moved her right hand behind her back so he wouldn’t see the starfish sex toy she had just washed and dried and was about to put away. Ashlyn and Ali shared a panicked look, the keeper with her sleep-filled face and messy bedhead looking particularly humorous. Dodge followed his Mama’s face and his own lit up when he saw Ali standing there.

“Mommy...” he smiled and moved to the end of the bed to give her a hug, quickly snatching his stuffed bear back off the bed again first.

Ali greeted him with all the love and affection she usually did and hugged him one-handed. She kissed him on the top of his adorable head and stood up again. She was behind schedule that morning and cleaning the toy from the night before had not helped. They had been so exhausted after their trying day and two rounds of sex that it had been all they could do to get up, pee, get dressed again and unlock the door before falling into bed at 1am, and fast asleep. Ali had taken the starfish to the bathroom with her last night but left it there so she could wash it in the morning. It had never occurred to them that their inquisitive morning visitor would pick up on the seashells at his feet.

“Look” Dodge pointed at the bed, tugging Ali’s free hand. “I picked up all the shells” he announced proudly.

“What a nice, helpful boy you are honey” Ali squeezed his hand as he led her to Ashlyn’s side of the bed, just a few feet away. 

She winked at her wife and Ashlyn felt immediate relief. There was no way the brunette would be giving her a cute wink if there was trouble brewing. She flopped back down on her back with a sigh.

“Why are they here?” he asked again, turning back to his Mama, and noticing the beach towels draped on the headboard of the bed for the first time. “And why are the towels here?”

“Oh, umm, well,” Ali stammered a bit before smoothly explaining the situation to the 5-1/2 year old boy. “Yesterday was kind of a tough day for Mama, she had a hard day at work and...”

“She forgot the cleaning” he nodded, referencing the dry cleaning and understanding what his Mommy was talking about.

“Here buddy, come snuggle with me” Ashlyn interrupted with her own small smile and lifted the covers up.

Dodge smiled and climbed up with his stuffed bear, curling up as the little spoon and watching Ali’s face intently as she continued explaining.

“That’s right” Ali nodded and tried not to giggle. “Well, I wanted to try and make her feel better so I tried to make the bedroom look kind of like the beach a little bit...”

“Mama loves the beach” he nodded again with a bigger smile.

“Yep” Ali grinned. “So I borrowed your seashells, and your brother and sisters’ too, and I spread them around and then I brought up some beach towels to try and help make it look like the beach too” she shrugged, one hand still behind her back.

“Did it make you happy Mama?” he tried to look at Ashlyn but couldn’t see her from his position.

“Yeah buddy, it sure did” the keeper kissed the top of his head. “Now be still little man, we still have...” she looked at the clock on her nightstand that said 6:40am, “15 minutes...”

“10 minutes” Ali quirked her eyebrow at her wife, knowing that it took Drew at least 5 minutes on his best day to get up and out of bed.

“10 minutes before we have to get up” Ashlyn corrected herself and blinked adoringly at her beautiful brunette who was walking over to her closet to put the starfish toy away, out of sight of their young son. “Mmmmm, you smell good” the keeper kissed Dodge’s head again after taking a big whiff. “Like sleepy little boy. My favorite scent.”

They both giggled as they snuggled together and Ali took a quick picture of them with the seashells near Ashlyn’s knees. That would be a sweet memory for a long time and they both knew it.

The school day was uneventful for young Dodge Krieger. He liked going to school and he really liked going to the same school that his big brother and big sister went to. It made him feel like he was important and like he belonged, finally, to the same group as Drew and Josie. Dodge had always made friends easily and played well with other kids. He was the most gregarious and outgoing of all four young Kriegers. Ashlyn described him once as like the mayor – he was always interested in meeting new people and just naturally assumed that they would want to meet him too. So school was a fun and exciting place for Dodge to be and he made the most of it. Surprisingly, he was a very good student. Ali and Ashlyn weren’t surprised because they thought their boy wasn’t smart, they were surprised because they really worried that he might have ADHD or something like that because he had such a hard time staying still for very long. There wasn’t much in the first 5 years of Dodge Krieger’s life that made those closest to him think he was going to be a very good student. But he turned out to be very bright and smarter than anybody suspected. His restlessness appeared to be strictly physical. 

There were two kindergarten classes at the East Gloucester Elementary school and Dodge and Lily were in the same class. Ali and Ashlyn had been given the choice to split them up or keep them together and it hadn’t been an easy decision for them to make. There were pros and cons to both and they finally decided to ask Dodge and Lily what they thought about it.

“So we have a question for you guys to think about” Ali had begun one afternoon while they were up in New Hampshire at the lake house during the four-family vacation late that August. 

Everyone had come in off the pontoon boat after a day on the lake and the other adults had agreed to give Ali and Ashlyn some time alone with their twins so they could talk about kindergarten without any comments from the loud peanut gallery. They both knew that Dodge was so eager to please his big brother that he would agree to whatever Drew called out – whether it was meant as a playful tease or not.

“But...” Dodge had pointed at the other kids being herded up the steps of the back deck and into the kitchen of the rental house.

“It’s ok Dodge” Ashlyn had nodded at him and pointed to the picnic table out on the grass between the lake and the house. “We’re going to sit here and talk for a few minutes and then we’ll go inside” she had given him a stern look so he knew she was serious.

“But why?” Lily had chimed in, a pout on her face as she imagined treats and goodies that the other kids were probably getting right at that moment.

“Just, because we need to ask you guys a question about kindergarten and we don’t want you to be distracted by anybody else or anything else when you give us your answer” Ali had moved to stand between the house and the picnic table, effectively cutting off the twins’ line of sight and, hopefully, imagination about what they were missing. Which, in all honesty, was mostly whining and complaining about being hungry or sandy or sticky or bored. They weren’t missing a thing.

“So listen” Ashlyn had sat on the bench across the table from her two youngest kids with her hands on top of it, reaching for their small hands to try and keep their attention. “You guys know you’re going to kindergarten in two weeks, right.”

Both twins had nodded affirmatively and sighed impatiently.

“Hey, the more you pay attention and listen to us the faster this will go” Ali had quirked her eyebrow at them both, annoyed by their behavior. “We’re not asking very much, are we?”

“No mommy” Lily had shrugged as if she had actually thought about it for a few seconds.

“Nuh-uh” Dodge had shaken his head and sighed again but it was more like a fresh start sigh than an annoyed sigh.

“Ok, so here’s the deal” Ashlyn had taken over quickly, hoping to seize on their receptive moods before they changed their minds again. “There are two kindergarten classes at school with two different teachers and you guys can decide if you want to be in the same class together or if you want to be in different classes instead.”

“Why?” Dodge had asked, scrunching his face up as he considered the situation.

“Why what?” Ali had joined her wife on the bench now that the allure of the house seemed to have passed.

“Why are there two classes?”

“Because there are a lot of kindergarten kids so they need to have two teachers and two classes” Ashlyn had explained patiently.

“But if there are different teachers then only one of us gets Ms. Johnson?” Lily had looked at them suspiciously, as if she had just uncovered the master scheme.

“That’s right” Ali had nodded.

Ms. Johnson had taught both Drew and Josie when they were in kindergarten and the twins had been looking forward to having the same teacher as their big brother and big sister. Plus, Drew and Josie had both adored Ms. Johnson and the twins remembered hearing good stories about the kind and friendly teacher.

“I want Ms. Johnson” Lily had blurted out, as if it had been a race.

“I want Ms. Johnson too!” Dodge had yelled, panic filling his face at the idea that he might have been too late with his claim.

“Ok, well here’s the thing” Ashlyn had used her hands to pat the air between them and settle them down again. “We don’t know which teacher you’ll get. The school decides which class you’ll go into. But they’re letting us decide if you want to be in the same class or not. So nobody is guaranteed Ms. Johnson” she had cautioned.

The twins had sat and thought for a couple of minutes and the moms had to try hard to keep straight faces because they could practically see the smoke coming out of their little ears as their brains worked hard.

“Here are the things that might happen” Ali stepped in when she could see the kids getting frustrated and worked up. “You could be in the same class and not have Ms. Johnson for your teacher. That’s one thing” she waited for them to take it in and nod their little heads. “You could be in the same class and have Ms. Johnson for your teacher” she took another beat. “You could be in different classes, and then one of you will have Ms. Johnson and one of you will have the other teacher instead.”

Both Ali and Ashlyn had noticed the frowns that covered both the kids’ faces when that possibility was spelled out to them. They knew their kids well enough to know that the idea that one of them would be stuck in a class with another teacher while the other had the beloved Ms. Johnson was just not going to work. That was the worst of the three options and it had been easy to read on their faces. Whether or not it was all selfish reactions where the kids were mad that their sibling got the golden egg and they did not, was impossible to tell. But both moms were pretty sure that was the root of the problem with that scenario. The decision had been made that afternoon that the twins would stay in the same kindergarten class and hope for the best when it came to getting the teacher they so desperately wanted. The two moms had been told by the school principal that it was typical for the same teacher to get the younger siblings of previous students. It wasn’t a rule and nobody would admit how the process worked at all. But it was explained to them that often times the familiarity that had grown between teacher and parents was very beneficial when it came to the younger siblings as well. It was just one less thing to have to worry about with the new school year if the teacher already knew some of the parents and the parents already knew what to expect from the teacher they had interacted with before. Two weeks later, Dodge and Lily had been thrilled to find out that they were both in Ms. Johnson’s kindergarten class that year.

That Thursday in January, Dodge went to his four classes, two recesses and lunch and participated at full-tilt like he always did. In Language Arts they were learning to use pronouns and how to make certain nouns plural by adding an ‘s’ or ‘es’. It was complicated stuff but Dodge had been talking for a long time by that point and did pretty well. The teachers always said that they could tell which kids’ parents put time in to read with them and which ones didn’t. Dodge was lucky that his parents always made time for that. In Math class, which was Dodge’s favorite, they were working on counting up to 20 and the basic concepts of addition and subtraction. Socialization or social studies was all about interacting with other human beings, whether they were classmates, fellow students at the school, teachers, administrators, or even parents and extended family members. Having already spent a lot of time on these subjects in preschool, most of the kindergarteners were ahead of the game in that class. Finally, Science was the other class for the kindergarteners and it entailed learning about basic things all around them and trying to get them interested in science as a concept worthy of future study and pursuit. Teaching 5-year olds about the earth and what it did and what it was made of and what lived on it was a pretty cool experience, whether you were an official teacher or just a parent trying to broaden your kids’ horizons. They really truly were like little sponges – just soaking up the knowledge and information you poured out to them. The teachers rotated through the other classes in the curriculum like Art and Music and Gym so the kids got those classes at least three times a week – just like the bigger kids in the elementary school.

The snow fell all day long, as expected, but it turned into a mixture of sleet and even freezing rain at one point in the afternoon. By the time Ashlyn got the four kids home from school they had all agreed that playing outside that afternoon wasn’t going to be happening any time soon. Not until the freezing rain turned back into snow anyway. 

“Alright you guys, hey! Dodge!” Ashlyn yelled after her youngest son as he started to walk into the first-floor hallway by the desk in the mudroom as soon as they all walked in the door. “Take your boots off. What are you doing? You know better than that” she shook her head at him when he turned and rolled his eyes at her.

“I have to pee” he replied as he tried to step out of his boots while leaning on the edge of the desk, standing on the hardwood floor instead of the giant waterhog mudroom rug that Ali and Ashlyn swore they couldn’t live without.

“Get your wet boots on the rug” she commanded sternly as she helped Lily out of her winter coat, pointing with her free hand at the rug everybody else, including the two wagging dogs, was standing on.

“Aw, Mamma” Dodge whined but took two steps towards the middle of the room and stood on the 5’ x 7’ rug that was designed especially to be used in mudrooms to soak up more water than most other rugs.

“Don’t ‘Aw Mama’ me” Ashlyn quirked her eyebrow, not happy with his attitude. “You know better. Now use your hands and take your boots off like a normal person” she frowned at his weak attempt to complete the task only with his feet. He was falling over and banging into both Josie and Drew and Ashlyn could tell her oldest son was about to push his younger brother back, hard. “Hurry up” she gave more instructions before bending over to pick up the hats and mittens that had just been dropped everywhere. “And everybody, pick up your stuff. It doesn’t go on the floor...” Persey came over and licked her right in the face as she was speaking. “Ugh, hi Pers” she chuckled and wiped her mouth off, giving the dog a pat and a hug.

“Mama, she licked you right on the mouth” Lily giggled and pointed at the keeper.

“She sure did” Ashlyn laughed and greeted Fred with similar affection. “Hang your coat up now sweetpea.”

“Mama, can we make a painting tonight?” Josie asked as she turned around to face the room after neatly hanging up her coat and putting her hat and mittens in the correct canvas storage totes under the bench on the wall of the mudroom.

“I don’t know honey” the keeper smiled at the redhead. “It’ll depend on how homework goes and music practice...” Ashlyn noticed how great a job the girl had done with her coat and things. “Look what a great job Josie did you guys. Thank you for doing that sweetheart.”

Drew went right downstairs to claim the tv for his video game time. He had his basketball practice the night before so he didn’t have to do his homework right away. He had to practice his trumpet twice more before school started again on Monday, but he was hoping his moms would forget about that for the night. He certainly wasn’t going to mention it. The other three kids gathered in the front living room to watch some cartoons and unwind while they enjoyed a snack after a hard day of school. It was 2:45pm and Ashlyn let them stay there until 3:30pm, using the end of the show as a natural stopping point. 

“Ok we should get our homework done so we’re not rushing to do it later tonight” the keeper urged as she turned the tv off and faced her three youngest kids. “Do you have a lot?” she asked Josie.

“Umm, math and my reading” she replied with a nod, her fat lip still looking sore and swollen.

“What about you guys” Ashlyn looked at Dodge and Lily.

“We, we, we...” Lily began as she remembered their assignment.

“We have to...” Dodge started to finish for her but he saw Ashlyn’s eyebrows go up as she silently told him to let his sister complete her sentence.

“Take a breath” the keeper urged Lily who did as told and then spit the whole sentence out seamlessly.

“We have to find 5 things in our house that begin with letters!” 

“Hmmm...” Ashlyn pursed her lips, knowing there had to be more to it than those vague instructions. “That sounds fun. Let’s go get started.”

They all regrouped in the dining room where Ashlyn read the instructions for the twins’ homework and told them exactly what they had to do. She stopped their progress to walk to the top of the basement steps, just across from the first-floor bathroom near the doorway into the mudroom, and yell down for Drew to get his butt upstairs and that she wasn’t going to ask him a third time.

“You have to find 5 things in our house that begin with a specific letter” she stepped back into the dining room and looked from Lily to Dodge and then back to Lily. “And you each have a different letter” she explained as she turned around the two pieces of paper where the instructions had been printed out with a letter typed much larger than everything else and in bold. “Lily your letter is ‘F’” she pointed at the ‘F’ on the page and let Lily study it for a minute. “Dodge, your letter is ‘R’. I think you should sit here and write down some words that start with your letter so you can think about what you might be looking for. Sound good?”

“Rainbow!” Dodge shouted out eagerly and bounced up and down on his chair.

“That’s right” the keeper nodded at her son. “Rainbow starts with ‘R’ but do you think you’ll find one in the house?”

“Ummm, maybe?” he shrugged, undeterred.

“Yeah, yeah” Lily nodded quickly. “The magnet on the fridge. That’s a rainbow!”

“Yeah!” Dodge took off at a sprint towards the kitchen, knocking his chair over in the process.

“Hey, now listen you two” Ashlyn stood with her hands on her hips once Dodge had returned with the rainbow magnet from Gay Pride 2028 in his fist. She wondered what picture or note or schedule item the magnet had been securing to the refrigerator and made a mental note to go check that out before something important got lost or destroyed. “This is not a race. There’s no rush. You will not destroy this house doing this homework assignment. Do you understand me?” she gave them both a serious look.

“Yes mama” they both replied at the same time.

“Ok, go find these things and bring them back here to me and I’ll make sure they’re correct” she instructed carefully, watching them both start to scamper away. “Dodge you come back here, please.”

The boy groaned and began to whine but when he saw Ashlyn pointing at the chair he had knocked over and not picked back up he knew what was happening.

“Sorry Mama” he said sheepishly as he righted the chair and then smiled at her. “Can I go now?”

“Yes...” was all she got out of her mouth before he was sprinting towards the front stairs. “No running and no climbing on anything!” she called after him. “Come get me if you can’t reach something!”

“He’s gonna climb something” Josie shook her head as she pulled her homework out of her backpack and sat on the other side of the dining room table.

“Yeah, this might have been a terrible idea” Ashlyn admitted quietly, hoping she was wrong. “Let’s see how it goes” she said as she sat next to the redhead and read the math homework assignment.

Drew slumped into a chair and pulled a writing assignment out of his backpack. He dug out a pencil and started to read the instructions to himself before putting the pencil to the paper and beginning to write slowly and carefully. At the end of a busy, noisy hour, Ashlyn was looking at the pile of objects on the end of the dining room table and chuckling. It was 4:45pm and Josie had given up on her reading homework because every time she started to read to Ashlyn, one of the twins came running up to show her their latest object. She had completed her math homework in about 15 minutes and then decided to practice her piano until the twins were done with their homework assignment.

“Hel-looo” Ali called out from the mudroom door, stomping her feet and shaking her trench coat as she took it off and put her briefcase down.

“Mommy!!” all four kids smiled and cheered from their different locations, Dodge and Lily running across the hall from the dining room to greet her with big hugs.

“Hi guys” Ali bent over and gave them both big hugs and kisses.

“You guys just keep doing what you’re doing” Ashlyn told Josie in the front parlor and Drew at the dining room table, smiling warmly at them both. “She’ll come in and say hi in a minute.”

“I have to pee!” Dodge announced as he turned and ran into the first-floor bathroom.

“Ok then” Ali chuckled and bent over to take her wet, snowy boots off so she could go and check in with her other two children and wife. She had already been welcomed home by the dogs in the same style as the twins.

“We’re doing our homework!” Lily explained excitedly, tugging the brunette’s hand into the dining room.

“Well I’m so glad to hear that baby girl” Ali caressed the back of her daughter’s head and grinned at how thrilled she was about whatever the homework assignment was. “It sounds like it’s a fun one.”

“Hey baby” Ashlyn leaned in and gave her wife a quick kiss on the lips and pat on her butt as the brunette started to walk by her to greet Drew.

“Hi hon” Ali returned the kiss and smiled sweetly at her keeper, still loving the way it felt to come home to her every day.

“Mommy, can I be done with this now?” Drew whined dramatically, knowing that Ali wouldn’t make any decisions without talking to Ashlyn first because she had just walked in the door.

“Hello sweet boy” she hugged and kissed him as he sat in the dining room chair. “I love you but I’m not even going to answer that question. You know better.”

“He should have been done a half hour ago but he won’t do it” Ashlyn shrugged. “I told him he had to sit there until it was done.”

“Well there’s your answer buddy” Ali gave him a slightly disappointed look as she moved into the front parlor, opening the gate that still blocked the room off from normal dog and kid traffic. She hugged and kissed Josie from behind as she sat on the piano bench and practiced her scales. “Hi little one, you sound so good. Are you having fun?”

“Yes!” Josie replied. “I can do them so fast now, see?”

“I do see” Ali enthused. “Great job honey.”

“Mommy, come look at our stuff!” Dodge yelled from the dining room.

“What is going on here now?” Ali chuckled as she stood next to Ashlyn, letting the keeper wrap her arm around her waist in a side-hug as they looked at the two piles of things the twins had collected.

Lily explained what their homework assignment had been, with a little help from Dodge and Ashlyn, and they let Ali do the honors of going through the collections. After a couple of items were found to be incorrect and the twins had run around to find replacements, Ali listed off the final items.

“Ok, Lily...” she looked at her blonde girl expectantly but when Lily didn’t do anything but return her gaze she spoke again, “you should write these down on your homework page, right?”

“Oh yeah!” Lily laughed and picked up her pencil, taking her seat again at the table.

“Oh my God” Drew rolled his eyes and chuckled. It wasn’t the bratty big brother being a jerk comment he sometimes made. It was more of his finding humor at his goofy brother and sisters kind of comment that they all knew was not meant to harm.

“We have a frame?” Ali questioned as she held up a small, magnetic picture frame from the refrigerator. 

Lily had gone back to the fridge when she thought of the rainbow magnet for her brother and had come away with the small framed picture of Ashlyn in her Breakers goalkeeper uniform.

“Yeah, frame starts with f” Lily nodded and began to write the word on her homework page. “What comes after the ‘f’” she asked adorably and kept writing when Ashlyn sat next to her and helped her with the spelling.

“And for Dodge’s first item we have a rabbit, right?” Ali looked at the boy for confirmation as she held up a small, plastic animal from one of their many playsets down in the basement.

“Yep” he nodded proudly and picked up his pencil.

The listing and writing and spelling took the better part of a half hour but it was cute and sweet and both kids and parents enjoyed it. The final tally for Dodge was a rainbow magnet, a rabbit, a robe from one of Josie’s barbie dolls, a rooster from the same animal playset that the rabbit had come from, and a short piece of rope that neither Ali nor Ashlyn could imagine where it had come from. Lily had gathered up the frame, a fork, a mini football, a small plastic flower, and a plastic fish from the animal playset.

“You both did a great job” Ashlyn praised the twins and exchanged high fives with them when they were done and both lists had been spell-checked and corrected. 

“I did mine fastest!” Dodge bragged and then wagged his butt towards his sister to celebrate.

“Oh, was it a race?” Ali asked, confused.

“No, it wasn’t” Ashlyn stood up and shook her head. “As a matter of fact I told them specifically not to rush through it because it wasn’t a race. And if we’re going to be honest about it” she quirked her eyebrow at Dodge who had stopped wagging his butt at Lily when he heard his Mama’s tone, “you had three mistakes with the things you collected Dodger, didn’t you?”

“Um, yeah” he looked down. “But Wee had mistakes too” he defended his performance, lifting his face again.

“I only had one mistake” Lily smiled and repeated herself in case anybody hadn’t heard her the first time. “I only had one mistake.”

“She’s right” the keeper continued, focusing on her youngest son, pulling him closer and squatting down in front of him. “Being fast is a good thing sometimes, but sometimes if you go too fast you make mistakes” she explained. “And the time you have to spend fixing those mistakes ends up taking a lot more time than maybe if you had just done the assignment a little slower in the first place. Do you know what I mean Dodger?” she squeezed his hip and smiled at him as he nodded his head. 

“There’s a saying that goes ‘slow and steady wins the race’” Ali added carefully. “And this is exactly what that means.”

“But I don’t want to be slow.”

“You don’t have to be slow” Ashlyn grinned at how cute Dodge looked in that moment. “That’s just a saying. But maybe if you went a little slower sometimes it might be better” she shrugged. “But maybe not either. It’s just something to think about. You’re really fast at a lot of things” she poked him in his belly. “Maybe sometimes you should slow down a little bit though. It might make it easier to get more things right.”

“But I’m fast Mama” he looked at her with confusion in his eyes.

“You’re very fast honey” Ali came around the table and put her hand on the top of his head and petted it gently as she spoke. “And that’s great. Don’t worry too much about it. You’ll figure out when it’s a good time to slow down a bit. You’re smart too. You’ll learn when a little less fast might make something easier. Ok?”

“Yeah, ok” Dodge nodded and tried to give his moms a smile but couldn’t quite muster it, which was unusual for the happy-go-lucky boy.

“Oh my God, this is hilarious” Drew laughed. “What an idiot” he shook his head derisively.

“That’s enough Drew” Ali snapped at him when she saw the hurt look on Dodge’s face. “Who’s the one who’s been sitting here for an hour trying to finish the same homework assignment and not getting anywhere?” she challenged with a scowl.

Ashlyn, Dodge and Drew were all stunned by the harsh words that had come out of Ali’s mouth. Lily was only half paying attention as she studied the small picture of Ashlyn. But the brunette had absolutely zero patience for one of her kids being purposefully mean to another. Nothing made her angrier, and that was saying a lot. She hated it especially when Drew was mean to Dodge because the younger boy idolized his big brother and she knew that any harsh words from him cut Dodge deeply. This was the mama bear side of Ali that Ashlyn would always love. She loved it a little less when it lashed out at one of their own kids, but she couldn’t judge her too harshly for it because she had felt the same urge to put Drew in his place. Ali had simply beaten her to it. Drew looked like he was going to cry and dropped his eyes as he tried like hell to fight off the tears.

“Alright, let’s put our homework sheets in our backpacks Dodge and Lily” Ashlyn stood up and tried to redirect things back to a safer space. She also didn’t want Drew to have to cry in front of the twins because she knew that would kill him. “Come on Dodge, let’s go” she tugged his arm towards the table where Lily was already doing what she had been told.

“Drew I’m sorry” Ali exhaled and rubbed her forehead as she took another deep breath. She was still angry at him but she wanted to make sure she apologized while the twins were still there to hear it. “I shouldn’t have said that. It wasn’t nice. I’m sorry” she paused for a second. “I just hate it when you guys are mean to each other. It makes me very very angry when that happens.” She took another deep breath and moved around the far end of the table to join him on his side where he still hadn’t moved or made a sound. The good news was that he wasn’t crying. The bad news was that he still hadn’t said anything else. “Do you understand why I lost my temper?” she asked softly as she put her arm around his shoulders and sat down in the chair next to him.

“Because I was mean to Dodge” he replied simply. “I know.”

“Mommy apologized to you, now I think you should apologize to your brother” Ashlyn suggested evenly as she stood with both twins at the end of the table.

“Sorry Dodgie” Drew sighed and sniffled, but he still didn’t cry.

“It’s ok” Dodge shrugged, his eyes locked on his big brother’s red face.

“Good job Kriegers” Ashlyn smiled and tried to tell her wife that she understood, all with just her eyes, but the brunette looked only from one son to the other, feeling like the worst mother on the planet. “Maybe Mommy can help you with your assignment Drew” the keeper suggested. “I’ll get dinner ready and maybe you can get started on it together?”

“But who’s going to read with me?” Josie asked from her spot in the front parlor, on the other side of the gate.

Things had gotten so tense in the dining room that they hadn’t noticed that she had stopped practicing her scales.

“One of us will read with you right after dinner, ok Jojo?” Ashlyn winked at her and then lifted her up and over the gate. “Your scales sure sounded good” she kissed Josie’s cheek as she placed her back on the ground in the dining room. “Will you help me set the table for dinner?”

After another minute it was just Ali and Drew sitting together, the brunette’s arm still around his shoulder while her fingers played with the thick hair at the back of his head. He hadn’t moved away or made any indication that he wanted her to stop, so she hadn’t. 

“What’s your assignment?” she reached for the piece of paper in front of him to read the instructions, noting that the page was indeed still blank where he should have been writing.

Later that evening, after homework had been finished and dinner eaten and showers taken, everybody piled onto the big ‘L’ shaped couch in the front living room to watch a show and have dessert before it was time to go upstairs for storytime and then bed. Ali and Ashlyn let the kids dictate how this hour usually went. They could watch a show, watch part of a movie and finish it the next night, or play a game. The only rule was that it had to be something calm and peaceful and they all had to hang out together in the front living room to do it. So no video games, no running around, none of that stuff or anything else that might get them all riled up before bed. That Thursday night they decided to play a board game together and finally agreed on Monopoly Empire. Drew didn’t always like to play some of the kids’ games because they were just too simplistic. And that was ok. He would happily watch a show while the younger kids played their game, which is exactly what happened Thursday night. Ali played as the fourth player and Ashlyn was the banker and they all had a good time, even Drew. The three little kids’ personalities were never more distinct than when they were playing a game together. Josie would do anything to win and her mood shifted wildly depending on her standing in the game. Lily was generally good-natured about the game, sometimes she did well and got extra excited and sometimes she just liked to play the game, regardless of how she was doing. That was a foreign concept in the Krieger household. She definitely liked to win, but she was the only one of them who had fun playing even if she lost – and that included both moms. Dodge loved playing games but he had a hard time sitting still. He was the kid who had to stand next to the coffee table and bounce up and down while he waited for his next turn. He would lean one way and then the other, bumping into whichever members of his family were closest to him. He meant no harm and didn’t try to escalate anything. He watched everybody take their turn and paid close attention to the goings on, he just liked to be up and moving at the same time.

“Alright Dodger, your turn” Ashlyn pushed the dice towards him and he grabbed them quickly and with great exuberance, as he did almost everything in his life. “Let’s see what you got” she continued and then cautioned him when she saw him cock his arm up by his ear, the dice held tightly in his fist. “Just roll them gently on the table now” her voice went up as she gave him a warning look. It was the fifth time she’d had to tell him the same thing and he had only taken 7 turns so far. “Don’t wipe everything out again...” she looked down at the game board quickly to try and remember where all the pieces were so she could restore order if he threw the dice so hard they knocked things onto the floor again.

“Easy Dodge” Ali chimed in, amused by his enthusiasm even though it made almost everything in their parenting lives more difficult.

The boy in the fresh, clean robot pajamas paused and then brought his arm down by his stomach again, taking his parents’ recommendations to heart. He dropped the two dice onto the game board and watched carefully as they spun and tumbled to a stop. 

“10!” he yelled out after taking a couple of seconds to add the 6 and the 4 together, his lips moving silently as he counted in his head.

“Oooh, good roll” Ali patted his back.

“Way to count big guy” Ashlyn praised. “Move your guy...”

“It’s not a guy Mama” Lily giggled. “It’s a troller” she corrected Ashlyn, using shorthand for the video game controller game piece that Dodge had chosen for his player token. Normally that would be Drew’s piece but since he wasn’t playing Dodge had snatched it up right away.

“Oh right you are” Ashlyn chuckled at the correction and watched Dodge move his troller around the board.

“That’s mine! I own that one already!” Josie stuck her hand up like she was waiting for the teacher to call on her in class.

“Ok, let’s see how much rent you owe” Ali leaned forward to look at the game board.

“$600” Drew commented from his spot next to the game players, stretched out on the couch paying more attention to the game than the tv show. “Her tower is at $600.”

“He’s right” Ali said, surprised, after peering at the board and making a mental note to get her eyes checked again. “Gotta pay your rent.”

“Aw, Jojo” Dodge complained as he counted out 6 of his $100 bills and handed them to his big sister.

“Lily’s turn” Ashlyn sped things along, knowing they had to keep things moving if they had any chance of finishing the game before it was time to go upstairs. 

Lily was in the lead and only had three slots left to fill in her tower to win the game. Josie was right behind her with only four slots left. Ali was in third with only half of her tower filled. And Dodge was a distant fourth, simply due to bad luck and bad rolls. One of the things that could happen if you rolled the dice and got the special ‘hand’ image on one of them instead of a number, was that you could swap your top property in your tower for anybody else’s top property in their game tower. Some properties were only worth one slot and the values went up by one all the way to 5 slots being the most valuable property. All you had to do to win the game was fill your tower all the way up and be the first person to do so.

“Nice roll girl” Ashlyn smiled at the little blonde girl who grinned back at her. “What’d you get?”

“Ummm...” Lily paused and started to add up the dice in her head. 

“That one’s easy Wee” he sighed and it was hard to tell if he was being impatient or if he was trying to give his twin some encouragement. He was a very smart kid and he was especially good with numbers and counting.

Ali and Ashlyn looked at each other for help identifying the motive but neither could be sure.

“Let her do it” Ali said evenly, just in case.

“I know” Dodge groaned and flopped back dramatically against the couch without looking where he was going.

He smacked the back of his head hard on Drew’s shin and the older boy’s face twisted in pain and anger.

“It was an accident” Ashlyn cut the confrontation off before it could get started. “Just relax” she instructed Drew who sat back and pulled his legs up in front of him and away from the menace that was his kid brother.

“Sorry Drew” Dodge turned around as he rubbed the back of his head. 

He looked wary and truly sad as he prepared for retribution from his big brother. Most other times he would have already received a kick in his back for inflicting that pain. When it became clear to him that Drew wasn’t going to hit or kick him back, he smiled gratefully at him and turned back to the game board where Lily was finally done counting.

“Five” she nodded and laughed at herself. “One, two, three...” she counted again as she started to slide the dog player token down one side of the board.

“Wait a minute” Ali leaned forward and stopped the girl from taking her move. “Did you look at the other die?”

Everybody looked and saw the ‘hand’ image, a symbol for a ‘swap’, facing up. Then they all quickly scanned the four towers to see if anybody had a big property at the top of their tower that was more than 3 slots high.

“Uh oh” Ashlyn laughed and winked at her wife. “Do you see the one you should swap with?” she asked Lily quietly, not wanting to give her the answer.

“Ummm...this one!” she squealed and took one of the biggest properties on the whole board off of the top of Ali’s tower.

After she had swapped Ali’s property for her own, the big new property more than filled the empty slots and made Lily the winner of the game.

“Mommy!” Josie yelled and stomped her foot in anger. “You helped her. She was going to move until you told her to look again” she crossed her arms in a huff.

“Great job Lily girl” Ashlyn congratulated at the same time Josie complained.

“And I’ve done the same thing for you a hundred times” Ali shook her head at Josie and gave Lily a high-five. “I didn’t tell her what to do and nobody cheated” she quirked her eyebrow at the redhead, a subtle dig at Josie’s own proclivity for cheating occasionally if it meant she would win whatever game they were playing.

“You can’t win ‘em all Josephine, my Jojo-bean, you know that” Ashlyn added calmly, hoping to soothe the upset girl. “Great game everybody.”

“Can we play for second?” Dodge cocked his head hopefully, not wanting the game to end.

“Not tonight” Ali patted his arm and was surprised when Dodge turned towards her and jumped into her arms, pushing her backwards onto the couch and landing them right next to Drew.

“Ooof, geez Dodge” she groaned and caught her breath with a chuckle as the boy hugged her chest hard and banged the top of his head into the bottom of her chin. “Ow...be careful...” she squeezed him and kissed his head.

“Sorry” he smiled and nuzzled into her neck.

Nighttime Dodge was almost as sweet as early morning Dodge. When he got tired he totally zonked out and you could almost see his body parts shutting down one at a time. The lunging jump into Ali’s arms had been his swan song and they all knew it. He reached out with his left hand and blindly found Drew’s upper arm with his arms folded across his chest while he watched tv. Ashlyn was busy putting the game away with the girls and trying to keep Josie from having a breakdown over losing the game, but Ali saw the sweet gesture and smiled. She turned her head to the right and grinned at Drew who not only allowed the contact, but went so far as to put his own hand on top of Dodge’s in a rare moment of brotherly love. They were all pretty good kids, but sometimes being 5 and 7 and 9 was hard and it made you do thoughtless and heartless things. Nobody knew that better than your siblings. Sure, the young Krieger kids fought with each other, a lot. But when it came right down to it, their moms knew they would be there for one another when they were really needed. And that made both Ashlyn and Ali prouder than almost anything else. Ali could feel Dodge’s body settling against her and his heart rate slowing down as he got sleepy and still and heavy. She rubbed his back with one hand and rubbed Drew’s leg with the other, enjoying the nice moment. Just when she thought she couldn’t love her two boys any more than she already did, she felt Dodge’s lips against her neck as they curled into a smile. That was it. That was too much. Moments like that one right there made her immeasurably joyful. Moments like that one were what helped her forgive and forget the innumerable hurts and stings her heart suffered every single day while parenting that crazy brood of kids. 

As they tucked the kids into their beds after storytime that night, Ashlyn and Ali helped Dodge get under his covers and made sure his nightlight was on and the sound machine was playing. They told him how much they loved him and wished him a sweet and peaceful sleep. He could barely keep his eyes open as he curled onto his side into a small ball of lovable, sleepy boy. They bent over and kissed him, one at a time, and just when Ashlyn was pulling her lips away from his soft cheek he spoke in a very small voice with heavy eyelids.

“I go slower at night. I get tired and I go slower” he nodded his head just a little bit and then burrowed deeper into his pillow as Ashlyn grinned down at him.

“That’s right honey” she caressed the side of his head. “Even fast boys like you need to slow down sometimes. You need to rest so you can be fast again tomorrow, right?”

“Mmmm Hmmm” he nodded even less perceptibly than before, his eyes all the way closed now. “Sometimes slower isn’t worser.” 

“That’s right baby boy” the keeper kissed his cheek again, unable to resist the adorable boy. “Sometimes slower isn’t worse. You’re absolutely right my smart boy.”


	5. Lily

Friday morning was probably the most normal and easiest morning they had enjoyed all week long. Thank God. The only things different about it were that it was the day of the food drive at school and it was snowing again. It had snowed about 6” overnight but it wasn’t enough to cancel school. The plows had been out taking care of the streets of Gloucester for hours by the time the Kriegers were ready to leave the big old house at 8:15am. They were a little late backing down the driveway but it turns out they would have been late anyway, even if Ashlyn hadn’t been racing around the minivan shoveling snow out of the way and making a path from the mudroom door to the vehicle for her beloved wife and kids.

“Lily, what are you doing?” Ali asked, exasperated, as she finally found her daughter in the pantry when everybody else was wearing hats and coats and boots and making their way to the minivan. “We’re late already, we’ve gotta go and you don’t even have your boots on yet!” her voice raised when she realized how much not ready Lily actually was. “Why are you in here now?”

The girl jumped a little when she heard her mother’s anxious voice, she had drifted into her own little world there in the pantry for the past ten minutes. Lily knew she was supposed to be putting her coat and boots on and getting ready with her brothers and sister to go to school. But she just had to grab a few more things first.

“Do you hear me?” Ali asked louder, getting angry at her daughter’s apparent indifference to the situation. 

Fred, who had been laying next to Lily’s feet on the floor of the pantry, lifted his head to look at Ali and that seemed to snap the girl out of her haze. She turned her head and smiled up at the brunette and Ali took in the whole scene for the first time. Lily was standing in the pantry with about 8 cans of soup and beans and other things stacked up on the floor in front of her. She had another can of soup in her hands, about to add it to the pile, when it occurred to Ali what she was doing. During dinner the evening before, Ashlyn had reminded everybody about the food drive and made sure all four kids knew it was their responsibility to find a can from the pantry and put it into their backpack to take to school the next day. That had brought about a lengthy, challenging discussion about what a food drive was and why it was needed in the first place.

“Sometimes not all families are lucky enough to have good jobs like Mama and I have” Ali had explained as they ate dinner around the nook table Thursday evening. “And without good jobs it’s hard to make money...”

“And without money you can’t buy food” Drew added his two cents, having participated in food drives for several years by that point. 

Josie had also brought a can of food in for the food drive before but this was the first time for the twins.

“That’s right” Ashlyn nodded solemnly. “Some families don’t always have enough food to eat so families like us who have some extra, bring it in during these food drives.”

“But why don’t they have enough food?” Dodge asked, his palms up in confusion as he tried hard to understand.

“Because they need their money to buy other things, like clothes and supplies for school” Ali replied, trying to keep it simple.

“But what do they eat then?” Dodge squinted as he still tried to comprehend what his parents were explaining.

“Well” Ali paused for a split second and met Ashlyn’s eyes across the table, looking for guidance. The keeper only shrugged, not sure why Dodge was asking so many questions. Neither Drew nor Josie had been bothered much by the previous food drives. “Sometimes they just don’t eat as much as we do. Or maybe the mom and dad don’t eat as much so the kids can have enough food. It all depends honey. But don’t worry about it” she smiled at the kids, hoping not to get derailed by a conversation they were too young to really understand. “There are food drives like the one your school is doing at a whole bunch of schools...”

“And remember that big pile of stuff at the grocery store around Christmastime?” Ashlyn sat up, realizing they had already partially had this discussion at the holidays. She waited for a few nods of approval and then continued. “That’s the same idea. So there are always people who share the extra that they have with the people who might not have enough, this time we’re doing it with the food drive at your school.”

“Is it the same thing as when you give the old man outside the store money sometimes?” Josie tilted her head and waited for Ashlyn to answer.

“Yeeesss” Ashlyn said slowly, unsure if her giving $5 or $10 to the alcoholic bum who begged outside of the grocery store was really the same thing or not. She got the same unsure shrug from Ali in return. “But listen, the point is that there are lots of ways people who need food can get it if they can’t afford to buy it themselves. That’s what the food drive is for and you guys don’t have to worry about anything other than making sure you bring a can with you tomorrow morning, ok?”

And that had been the end of the discussion until Friday morning when it was time for the kids to put their can into their backpack. They all trooped into the small pantry and Ashlyn had to pull Fred out of the way so all four kids could move around each other in there. Drew grabbed a can of black beans, which he loved and which warmed both his mothers’ hearts when they saw him donate one of his favorite things, and moved out of the scrum without skipping a beat. Dodge, assuming everything was a race, blindly grabbed a can off of the shelf and hustled out after Drew. Josie took a minute and debated between two flavors of canned soup before choosing one that she knew Ali liked, a white bean Italian soup, instead of one of the ones the kids enjoyed. After she left the pantry both Ali and Ashlyn moved on to other things, expecting Lily to make her selection and follow the rest of the family to the mudroom. Instead, Fred joined Lily as the girl studied the pantry shelves hard.

“Lily, if you don’t answer me you’re going to be punished after school today” Ali gave one last warning and was quickly losing her temper.

“I don’t think one is enough” Lily shook her head and lifted her sad face up towards her mother. She put the can in her hands on top of the stack in front of her and spoke again, her little voice echoing loudly inside Ali’s head and heart. “How many can I bring?”

It wasn’t always easy for most people to see, but Ali had recognized it right from the first time she had held the newborn girl in her arms in the surgical delivery room. Ashlyn had been trying to breastfeed Dodge, who had been born 15 minutes before his twin sister, and Ali had sat right next to her and held sweet little Lily in her arms. Lily had been the tiniest of all of their babies and the brunette could not get over how perfectly formed she was. But aside from her nice round head and her perfect, pretty face, Ali could see her wife’s big beautiful heart beating inside the baby girl’s chest. It had nearly taken her breath away that day in the operating room. And now, five years and eight months later, it was on full display. Ashlyn’s incredible heart that Ali had fallen in love with as they had become friends almost fourteen years ago, was alive and well and growing inside their youngest daughter. 

It was easy to see Lily’s bratty side, or her diva side. She could be a complete drama queen if she didn’t get her way sometimes. It had been worse when she was younger and seemed to have a crying fit at any unexpected detour from the plan she had in her head. She would have a fit if she lost one of her little treasures that she insisted on carrying with her for a couple of years there. If Lily was in a foul mood or a disagreeable mood, then everybody suffered. Drew was particularly close to the youngest member of the family and Ashlyn was convinced it was because he had gotten used to trying to be sweet and kind to her to placate her when she was a baby, for everybody’s sake. Luckily, he had never seen it that way and their fondness for one another had continued and grown over the years. Nobody was sure what caused the eventual change in the little girl, but they were all happy that it had happened. She grew to be less fussy and less demanding and less dramatic. It was almost like she had mellowed out by the time she turned 5 years old. She had matured and grown comfortable with her place in the family dynamic or something. It was true that she had become the kid whom all the other kids didn’t mind having around – and that was really saying something. It almost felt like she had fussed so much about so many things the first 3 or 4 years of her life that she had gotten it out of her system. Lily still had her moments and she could still throw a hell of a tantrum when she wanted to. She was far from a perfect child, but who wasn’t? She had become much more laid back about almost everything in her life. Ashlyn had asked Mattie about it during one of her own therapy sessions.

“Some children, especially toddlers, can see their siblings as competition” Mattie had explained a year or so earlier.

“You mean, like for attention and love?”

“Yes, and even for the basics like food and shelter. Lily had to fight with Dodge for her own space inside your womb Ashlyn, and I think maybe she just assumed she was going to have to continue to fight once she was born too.”

“Wow, I never thought about it that way before” the keeper’s eyes went wide. “So once enough time went by for her to understand that we were going to take care of her, no matter what, she just...relaxed?”

“Pretty much, yes” Mattie chuckled at the simplistic but accurate summation.

“So there wasn’t anything we did wrong or...”

“Ashlyn, I’d say it’s a wonderful example of what great parents you and Ali are” the therapist smiled warmly when she saw the relief on the keeper’s face. “The truth is we still don’t know everything there is to know about babies and toddlers. I’m not sure we ever will. But the survival instinct is alive and well in all of us. Lily included.”

Ali and Ashlyn had both talked to Mattie about their concerns about Lily and how manipulative she could be. They had shared several examples of Lily lying about who did what and who hit whom first. They admitted to being fooled by her games for quite a while and giving Dodge most of the blame simply because he hadn’t been convincing enough in his own defense. 

“She played us Al, plain and simple” Ashlyn shook her head one night when the twins were only two years old. “I can’t believe our sweet baby girl would do that.”

They had finally caught their youngest daughter red-handed as she instigated a fight with her twin brother and then played the victim for her mothers to great effect. Ashlyn had seen the whole thing. She had been out on the front porch changing one of the lightbulbs and taken a few minutes after she was done to watch the twins playing together through the front window of the front living room. It had been cute and playful teasing at first with lots of giggles coming from both kids. But then, as it progressed, Lily kept pushing harder and throwing bigger things at Dodge and finally just went over and pushed him backwards onto the floor with all of her strength. Ashlyn watched with her mouth open, trying to decide whether or not to run back in there or not. While she was mulling it over, Dodge bounced up with an angry look on his face and pushed his sister back. Lily landed hard on her butt and fell backwards, hitting her head against the floor harder than Dodge had after her initial push.

“Mama, he push me!” she wailed to the keeper as she rushed in the mudroom door to restore peace. 

Lily’s face was bright red and full of tears and Ashlyn could tell the bump to the head had really hurt her. The girl took a couple of deep, ragged breaths and then lashed out at Dodge who was standing close by, watching things go down.

“Hey, now, just be still baby girl” Ashlyn knelt and pulled the girl into her arms and kept her there. “Dodge, what happened?”

“Umm...she push me!” he declared in his 2-year old speak.

“Bad Dod” Lily scolded her brother from the safety of Ashlyn’s arms, her face was still red and it was contorted and angry and twisted in toddler rage.

“If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes I wouldn’t have believed him” Ashlyn explained later that night to her wife. “We’ve always just taken her word for things because she seems so...”

“So sure of it” Ali nodded thoughtfully as she folded clothes on their big bed. “Here, help me so we can go to sleep” she tossed a handful of tiny clothes towards the foot of the bed where Ashlyn was pacing as she talked.

“I’ve been rethinking a million different things all afternoon” the keeper continued, standing still and folding at the same time. “She’s always so believable and trustworthy and we’ve punished Dodge so many times and I’ll bet you it wasn’t his fault half of those times.”

“That’s totally normal behavior for most children” Mattie had reassured them when they had confided in her about Lily’s devious ways back then. “Nothing to be concerned about” she chuckled. “Most kids push boundaries just to see how far they’ll be allowed to go. It sounds like Lily might just be on the leading edge of that with the twins.”

“You mean Dodge isn’t smart enough to try that?” Ali asked tentatively.

“No, not at all” Mattie shook her head. “That’s not what I’m saying. For whatever reason, Lily is entertained by doing it. That’s what it sounds like to me” she shrugged. “Once she gets a little older and develops some more interests it’ll probably stop. And now that you know about her little tricks you can try and correct the behavior too.”

“How do we do that?” Ashlyn asked, leaning forward eagerly and looking forward to the much-needed advice.

“If you’re really worried about it I can recommend a child psychologist” Mattie began but Ali interrupted her, her face pale at the thought.

“You don’t think we need to do that, do you?” the brunette choked out, trying not to panic.

“No I don’t” the therapist shook her head kindly at the both of them. “I would start by trying to correct her behavior – when she comes to you like that you punish them both” she shrugged. “It’s kind of old-school, but very effective. It’s not ideal because you don’t want either of them to feel like you don’t care about the details or the facts. That would be very counterproductive as a permanent way forward. But you might want to try it in the short term and see what happens. Maybe that’s what she enjoys? Seeing her brother punished. Or maybe she enjoys the alone time after he gets put into a timeout? Who knows? She may not know. But once that desired outcome goes away she may stop doing it altogether. Then you can go back to your normal method of conflict resolution.”

And that’s exactly what they had done back in 2025 when the twins had been two years old. And it had worked like a charm. It had confused the hell out of Dodge for a while but after a few weeks Lily had gotten the message. So it was understandable when friends or other family members didn’t always appreciate the softer side of Lily Krieger. Sometimes that side of the girl was elusive as fuck and even her two moms struggled to put up with her quirks and seemingly whimsical changes of heart and mind. The girl couldn’t make a decision to save her life and that was still true in January of 2029. It was easy to misunderstand the pretty little blonde girl with the dancing hazel eyes, adorable dimple, and sweet giggle. But Ali had seen into her soul that very first time she had held her in her arms and she knew just how much of her beloved Ashlyn had been passed down to her sweet Lily girl. The more Lily matured the easier it was to see those moments, and they were never more on display than when she interacted with animals, especially dogs. Even when she had been at her brattiest and most difficult, Lily would always have a gentle, loving hug for any animal that crossed her path. Nothing ever stopped that from happening. The girl was never happier or more at peace than when she was with a dog, preferably Fred because he allowed her to do anything in the world to him without so much as lifting an eyebrow at her. Somehow between 2 years old and 5 years old Lily had changed. She had become comfortable and confident in her own skin and had turned into a relaxed, easy-going little girl in the process. Perhaps overcoming most of her speech impediment had aided the process as well. It was hard to say for sure. Aside from Josie’s physical recovery from her many issues at childbirth, none of the kids had transformed as much as Lily had in the time they had been alive. 

Ali felt her heart burst as she looked down at the little girl in the pantry with the sad face and the tall stack of canned goods at her feet. Of course Lily had been the one who wanted to bring more than one can. Of course she had been the child who had thought more deeply about it than the others. Of course Lily felt so many emotions for strangers who might not have enough food to eat. It made perfect sense to the brunette that morning as she squatted down next to her youngest child and played gently with her long blonde hair running down her back.

“You’re only supposed to bring one can today” Ali began and then added quickly when she saw Lily turn her face with a quivering lip towards her in protest. “But how about if we bring the rest of these cans to one of the other food donation places this weekend? Ok?”

“Where is that?” Lily cocked her head as she considered her mother’s solution.

“Well, there are a few places we can donate them” Ali explained carefully. “But we don’t have time to talk about it right now sweetheart, we have to go. We’re so late now...”

“What in the world is going on in here?” Ashlyn’s voice was high and she was out of breath as she skidded to a stop outside the pantry door, her socks sliding on the hard wood floor.

“Lily didn’t think one can would be enough to bring today” Ali stood up and shared a big, goofy, grateful smile with her surprised wife. “But I explained that she could only bring one can to the food drive today...”

“But we can bring more this weekend to some other place!” Lily added with excitement and the first smile either mom had seen on her face since breakfast.

“Wow” Ashlyn raised both eyebrows as she took in all the information and tried to catch her breath after speed-shoveling around the minivan. “Ok then. I like it” she nodded. “Grab a can then girlie and let’s get moving. You don’t want to miss the food drive do you?” 

“No!” Lily yelled, grabbed the top can on her stack and ran past both moms to put her boots and coat on in the mudroom.

“Nice babe, really nice” Ali smirked at her wife after Lily had raced past them both. “The food drive isn’t going anywhere.”

“We know that but she doesn’t” Ashlyn leaned forward and kissed Ali’s cheek, her cold nose making the brunette yelp and pull away.

“God, your nose is so cold! Get away!” Ali laughed and pushed her wife back so she could go to the mudroom and put her own boots on.

“Hey” Ashlyn stopped her with a hand on her waist, her fingers digging in insistently. “She was really in there picking out all those cans because she didn’t think one was enough?”

Ali turned and faced her keeper, cupping her chilly cheek with one hand and leaning in close to her.

“She was” the brunette smiled softly and caressed Ashlyn’s cheekbone with her thumb as she stared into the first of three pairs of dancing hazel eyes she had ever loved. “She’s got your amazing heart honey. You’ll have to teach her how to keep it safe” she leaned forward and pressed a tender but earnest kiss to Ashlyn’s cold lips.

The keeper was about to say something else but a loud voice snapped them out of their intimate moment.

“Mommy, come on! We can’t miss the food drive!” Lily yelled from the mudroom. “Bye Pers” she patted Persey on her head and called out one last farewell before heading out the door towards the minivan. “Bye Fred! See you after school!”

The school day progressed without incident and Lily and the rest of the Krieger kids deposited their food drive cans in the big donation box in the lobby of the elementary school, just inside the main entrance. Ashlyn followed the kids in to help them get the cans out of their backpacks and into the box and she wasn’t the only parent to do so. Those were the decisions that she found the most difficult. When was she supposed to stop doing things for the kids? Surely Drew could manage to help his younger siblings get the cans out of their backpacks, right? But, then again, should he have to? It was complicated for the keeper and she and her wife talked about it often. Ashlyn was keenly aware of how fiercely Ali defended Josie’s right to do things herself, despite her diminutive size. The keeper was afraid she was starting to baby the other kids instead. It was a slippery slope that they would have to handle together, and on a child by child basis.

Lily and Dodge went to Math class first, then Language Arts, then to the gym for indoor recess at 10:45am. Then both classes of sweaty kindergarteners joined the first graders in the cafeteria for lunch at 11:05am. Lily sat at a table with some of her classmates, mostly all girls, and ate the peanut butter and jelly sandwich with the crusts cut off that one of her mothers had made for her. She laughed and talked with the other girls and giggled when Nina stuffed one of her French fries up her nose and it got stuck for a few seconds. The whole table erupted in laughter and even the rowdy boys’ table turned to see what the excitement was all about. Science class came right after lunch, followed by their second recess period which they took outside in the snow. All of the teachers agreed that it was just a good idea to get the kids outside at least once a day, regardless of the weather. But if it was raining or too cold and windy they fell back on the old reliable indoor gymnasium instead. Another tricky part of outdoor recess in the snow was when a handful of kids didn’t have the appropriate outer gear to stay safe and warm in the snow. It broke the teachers’ hearts but they couldn’t let those kids go outside for recess so one teacher stayed indoors with them while the rest went outside. The first time it had happened, Lily and Dodge had been confused and asked their parents about it. Ali and Ashlyn had explained that not every kid’s parents could afford to buy all sorts of different clothes for all the different types of weather. Some kids only had sneakers and maybe one pair of dress shoes to go to church in on Sunday they had explained. It hadn’t helped Dodge and Lily understand very much but now that they had the new information about how some kids didn’t always have enough food to eat at home...the twins were starting to get more parts of the picture. 

Lily ran around outside for the whole 15 minutes of afternoon recess, her long blonde hair flowing loose and free behind her. It was constantly in her face and it still drove both of her moms crazy but never seemed to bother Lily one bit. She just held it back with one hand if too much of it covered her eyes and made it hard for her to see. After recess they only had one class left and that day, Friday, it was Art Class. Both Dodge and Lily enjoyed their art classes when they popped up in their schedules a couple of times a week. Today it was in place of their normal Socialization class, for example. The Krieger kids were all very familiar with most of the art mediums they played with at school because they had spent so much time up in Ashlyn’s studio with her, as well as with Ali, over the years. They dove right in willingly no matter what the art teacher presented to the class. Lily in particular was working on doing her own thing and worrying less about following somebody else’s rules when it came to her drawing or coloring or painting. Both of her moms felt bad that their youngest daughter had grown up with Josie influencing her in the art department. Sometimes it was subtle and was really just Lily seeing what her big sister was doing and trying to duplicate it as best she could. Other times Josie was her bossy self and instructed her little sister what to do or, worse, criticized her for what she did if it wasn’t up to Josie’s standards. It was part of being a younger sibling, both Ali and Ashlyn knew it, but they hated it. Poor Lily had deferred to Dodge in the womb – they had no proof of this of course, but neither woman doubted it for a second. And once she could walk and talk, she had deferred to bossy Josie in just about everything else. The two moms went out of their way to make sure Lily knew that she was the boss of herself and that just because Josie and Drew were older than she was she was still allowed to make her own decisions when it came to play time and art time and every other time. It was tricky to try and teach her that while instilling the importance of team work and sticking together as a family at the same time. But they were working on it. Now that the kids were all in school and spending less time together it would get easier for Lily to find her own voice in that regard. She had already shown great progress in the first term of kindergarten. Ms. Johnson had given her high marks for her independence during parent/teacher conferences in November and Ashlyn and Ali were both relieved to hear that their girl was growing and learning how to be herself without worrying about making anybody else happy.

Lily’s stuttering and mumbling speech problem was almost gone too. She still stumbled a bit when she tried to talk too fast which happened if she got really excited about something. A gentle reminder from someone always did the trick and after a quick pause and a deep breath she would spit the words out just fine. Drew had even started to help her with it if it was just the kids hanging out together. The first time Ashlyn had heard him do this, as she was coming down the stairs to the basement one afternoon before dinner, she almost shouted out loud with pride and love for her biggest boy. For all their bickering, the kids really did love one another and both their moms were sure that they genuinely wanted their siblings to do well. Krieger teamwork.

By the time school was out it had snowed another few inches and was still coming down at a pretty good clip. Lily skipped into the gymnasium at 2:15pm expecting to find Ashlyn waiting there for she and Dodge, as usual. 

“Mommy!!” she yelled out when she saw Ali standing there talking with a couple of the other kindergarten moms.

“Lily girl!” Ali yelled back and opened her arms wide to receive the big, running hug from the grinning girl. “Hi baby boy” she greeted Dodge as he followed close on his sister’s heels and they all shared a group hug. “How was your day?”

“Good!”  
“We did Art today!”

“You did? That’s great you guys” Ali’s nose-crinkling grin filled her face as she listened to her two children tell her all about their day. 

The three of them sat cross-legged on the floor of the gym in their own little circle and talked for ten minutes before Josie ran over to join them. Five minutes after that the rest of school got out and they moved to the hallway and found Drew before heading out into the falling snow to the minivan. The snow was even heavier to the West and, although it wasn’t supposed to be an official Nor’easter, a lot of companies had closed their offices in Boston and Cambridge early so their employees could get home in the Friday afternoon rush hour that would be brutal because of the snow. Ali had jumped at the chance to get home early and avoid the traffic and she encouraged everyone at Knight-Harris to do the same thing. She had even convinced Whitney to leave before her and bring Becca and Tommy up to the big old house for some sledding that afternoon. If they got out onto the hill in the empty lot next to the house by 3pm they’d have almost two full hours left before it got too dark out to see anymore. By the time the Kriegers got home, the whole Flanagan family, including perennial favorite Ryan, were already sledding with Ashlyn while Persey and Fred barked and jumped around inside the backyard. Persey did most of the jumping and whining while Fred stood there at the gate to the empty lot and barked his head off to try and tell them that they had left the dogs behind.

“Awww, they already started” Lily whined sadly when they heard the whoops and laughter coming from the other side of the house as they unloaded themselves from the minivan in the driveway.

“Well hurry up and get changed into your sledding stuff” Ali nudged them all into the mudroom. “Pee first everybody, please” she added loudly and smiled when she saw that Ashlyn had already set out everybody’s snow stuff for them in the front living room. There were five separate piles of snow pants and jackets and hats and scarves and mittens to go with the boots the kids were already wearing and Ali could not have been more grateful. The fifth pile was her own snow gear. “God I love that woman” she said to nobody in particular as she ran up the backstairs to change out of her work clothes.

It took about 15 full minutes, but when they were all dressed and ready for the snow Drew lagged behind and was the last of the kids to the mudroom door.

“What’s up bud?” Ali asked as she saw a conflicted look cross his cute face.

“Ummm...” he looked down nervously before taking a deep breath and meeting his mother’s curious gaze. “Don’t I have my music lesson at 4?”

“Oh, honey, I forgot to tell you, I’m so sorry” Ali gave him a hug and felt guilty knowing he had been worrying about this ever since she had told them about the sledding plan on the drive home thirty minutes earlier. “They cancelled the music lessons at the studio tonight because of the snow. You don’t have to worry about that, ok?”

“Oh whew” he laughed and his face lit up. “I mean, I like going to them” he clarified quickly because he really did like playing the trumpet. “But I’m glad I don’t have to go this afternoon.”

“Yeah, it would be hard to leave when everybody else was having such a fun time sledding, huh?” she winked at him and guided him out the door and into the snow.

As they stepped outside and turned to walk towards the gate into the backyard that Ashlyn had dug out so they could open it, Lily ran into view from behind the house. She was out of breath and her cheeks were bright pink even though she’d only been outside for a few minutes.

“Come on Drew! Mama has the path all ready!” she waved her arm at him in a big circle and then ran back behind the house towards the empty lot, with Persey running behind her.

Lily had been correct. Ashlyn and Ryan had taken several runs themselves to establish a sledding path that would hopefully stay safe and away from several of the trees on the lot. They had toyed with different paths over the years and Ashlyn had even had some trees removed with winter sledding in mind a few years ago after a big storm required some tree maintenance and clean up. To be safe though, there was always a grown-up at the bottom of the hill area who could, hopefully, intervene if any of the sleds veered off course and into danger. The hill wasn’t very steep, but steep enough for some good sledding. It wasn’t attractive or enticing enough for any of the teenagers in the area to want to use it, which was good for the Kriegers. Before too long, Micky Donaldson, their 14-1/2 year old neighbor, had joined them and her father Neil came over a few minutes later too. The snow was falling and it was big heavy snowflakes. It wasn’t coming down too hard or fast yet but you could tell it was going to before too much longer. It was great sledding snow and good snowball making snow and the group had a ton of fun for those two hours. The sun started to set at about 4:30pm but it took until almost 5:30pm for it to be truly dark outside. 

The kids had all been having a great time and behaving themselves for the most part. Tommy Flanagan was adorable at 19 months old and just learning to appreciate snow for the first time. Becca would be turning 4 years old in March and was getting bigger and braver and funnier all the time. She had one of the very best laughs any of the four family friends had ever heard. As had happened with all of the kids that joined the ranks of the four families, Becca struggled to keep up with the older kids. She was a year younger than Maddox Dwyer and not quite two years younger than the Krieger twins so those were her prime targets. Lily had always been patient with the younger girl, perhaps remembering how it felt to be the youngest for a while, just hoping Penny Cross, a year older than the twins, would play with her. But Lily had at least had Dodge if all else failed. For Becca, her own kid brother was too young to offer any sort of companionship or entertainment. That Friday afternoon in the snow, Lily went out of her way to slow down for Becca and to let her share her sled with her, grabbing the younger girl tightly around her waist and keeping her safe and secure on their trip down the hill.

“Look at your girl being so sweet to my girl” Whitney bumped shoulders with Ashlyn as they stood at the bottom of the hill waiting to receive and protect the next sledders at the top of the hill – Lily and Becca.

“I’m having a hard time taking my eyes off of my wife with your cute son” Ashlyn rolled her eyes and groaned.

It was an ongoing joke between the two best friends that Ali Krieger was jonesing for another baby. Ashlyn had confessed that the brunette had never even looked at her back in their early, hot and heavy days the way she looked at babies these days. Whitney admitted that she had often gone down to the day care at Knight-Harris to check on Tommy, only to find Ali cuddled up with him, reading to him or playing with him with a huge grin on her face.

“Don’t worry, I won’t let her have him. I promise” Whitney bumped her shoulder again and chuckled. “Look at our girls will ya?” she waved up the hill to them and Ryan who was holding the back of the sled as Lily and Becca got situated in it. 

It was one of the plastic sleds that you sat in and that had a 3” lip that ran all the way around it. Ryan pulled the rope inside and tucked it under Lily’s leg so it didn’t come loose during their trip down the hill and snag on something or get stuck under the sled and slow them down. Dodge tried to jump in at the last minute but Ryan blocked him with one strong arm just as he let the sled go. Ashlyn rolled her eyes at her son’s antics.

“God, your freaking godson is a pain in the ass sometimes isn’t he?” she joked, loving the fact that she could admit how annoying Dodge could be to her best friend without worrying about any judgment.

“Hey, watch it” the lawyer punched her hard in the arm. “That’s my godson you’re talking about. If you’d just focus on the girls...”

As the words left Whitney’s lips the gleeful squeals coming from the sled filled the air and made both women at the bottom of the hill laugh out loud and grin broadly. Lily was holding Becca tightly from behind while the younger girl waved her arms all around, up and down and out to the side. She even tried to clap her hands a few times but the winter mittens took the fun out of that. Just as they got about four feet from the bottom of the hill one of the girls must have shifted their weight or maybe the sleds and tubes had gone down the hill enough times to wear down an uneven spot there, whatever the reason, the sled suddenly tilted sharply to the right and dumped both girls out into the snow. Lily’s boot got stuck in the rope and she got dragged about two feet before Whitney could get there to stop both the sled and the older girl.

Everybody got really quiet for a few seconds and Ryan was ready to sprint down the hill to check on everybody when Ashlyn held her hand up, telling him to stand down as she jogged over to Whitney’s side. As soon as the loud, crunching noise her boots made in the snow stopped, she and Whitney heard a quiet giggle that started to grow louder and louder. Whitney bent down and flipped the sled over to reveal Lily lying on her back in the snow and giggling.

“That was awesome!” Becca sat up a couple of feet behind Lily with a huge smile covering her face. Her hat was also covering more than half her face and both women wondered if she could even see. “Can we do that again?”

“Yeah!” Lily laughed and started to make a snow angel since she was already on her back and covered with snow anyway. She looked like an actual angel – her cherubic face beaming from underneath her own winter hat, with long strands of dirty blonde hair splayed across it and all around her head. “That was awesome” she gleefully repeated Becca’s pronouncement and then laughed out loud.

“Get up here you silly monkey” Whitney chuckled as she lifted Lily up and out of the snow angel.

“Come here you munchkin” Ashlyn stepped forward and picked Becca up, placing her on her hip in one smooth move.

“You girls are crazy” the lawyer laughed as she bent over and tried to fix Lily’s hat and get the hair out of her face. “Are you ok? Nobody got hurt?”

“Look out below!” Ryan called out from the top of the hill where Dodge and Josie were already loaded into the next sled.

“Come on, get outta the way now” Ashlyn hustled to the bottom of the sled path, kicking the girls’ sled out of the way as she went.

“But Mama, my snow angel!” Lily complained in the middle of her laughter as Whitney moved her away from the bottom of the slide path.

“That’s why you don’t make snow angels in the middle of the sledding path sweetpea” Ashlyn shrugged her shoulders and put Becca back down on the ground, adjusting the girl’s hat so she could see where she was going.

They were all distracted by the yells and shouts of Dodge and Josie as they came down the hill. Everybody could hear the redhead telling her little brother not to try and tip the sled over on purpose. They sounded like an old married couple, bickering the whole way down. When they were about six feet from the bottom, Josie bailed. She rolled herself off the back of the sled in an attempt to avoid whatever mayhem Dodge had planned.

“Good for you Josie!” Ali yelled out from the top of the hill. She was proud of her girl for taking control of her own destiny, at least for the next few minutes anyway. “Atta girl!”

The four at the bottom of the hill watched and laughed as Dodge vainly tried to flip the sled over as the girls before him had done. His great effort failed and he had to settle for rolling over and pulling it on top of himself when it was almost at a complete stop. He was laughing loudly and from deep in his belly when he finally pushed the sled off a minute later.

“You big knucklehead” Ashlyn chuckled as she extended her arm down to help him up. “Was that fun?” she asked as she brushed some of the snow off of him.

“Not really” he shrugged and laughed some more.

In another minute they were all laughing at his antics as Josie trudged back up the hill muttering to herself about how she should have known better than to get into a sled with her crazy brother in the first place. No-one could argue with her. Ashlyn started back up the hill too, tugging both sleds behind her and reminding Dodge not to walk up the middle of the path and ruin it with his boot steps.

“You guys coming?” she paused and looked over her shoulder at Whitney, Becca and Lily.

“Nope” the lawyer grinned up at her. “Lily’s gonna teach us how she makes such great snow angels. We’ll be up in a while.”

Ashlyn chuckled as she watched her daughter talking seriously to Becca before letting herself fall backwards into the snow. She laid very still, while continuing to explain what she was doing, and then started fanning her arms and legs out in the snow. The keeper wasn’t sure what was cuter – Lily doing the cute tutorial, or Becca trying to take it all in. She chuckled to herself and decided that it was Whitney grinning like an idiot at the two girls who were getting along so well. 

They all ate dinner together after it got dark out and they had to go back indoors. The Kriegers made sure the Flanagans knew they were more than welcome to spend the night but they declined the offer and headed back home after dinner. Ryan had been driving in snow his whole life and knew what he was doing. The snow had piled up a bit but there was no big storm or unruly winds to make everything hard to deal with so no-one was worried about them getting home safely. Ali was leaning towards letting the kids skip their showers that night but they all had basketball games the next day and Dodge’s was first at 9am.

“Aw Mommy, you said we didn’t have to take showers tonight” Josie whined when the brunette started to get everybody moving upstairs after the Flanagans left.

It was already almost 8pm and there would barely be enough time for showers and a quick storytime before bedtime. The afternoon and evening had been a ton of fun and nobody regretted a second of it. But the schedule for the night was off and there was no getting it back. But that’s what Friday nights were for.

“No, she said we might not take showers tonight” Ashlyn corrected. “But there’s time so let’s just get them done. Hurry up, buttercup. Let’s go” she rallied the tired troops up the front stairs, following Ali who had already started up with Dodge.

“Just think about how much better tomorrow morning will be because we got them done tonight” Ali encouraged optimistically. “I’ve got Dodge, who’s going first with Mama?”

It was the fastest showertime of the whole week and that was a direct result of both moms participating at the same time. They always tried to tag team it but shit happened during the week and sometimes it just didn’t work out that way. But they flew through it Friday night without the complications of homework or anything else getting in the way. The kids were all tired after their rigorous sledding expedition but they were well-behaved and fairly pliable when it came to getting lotioned up after their showers and into their jammies. Josie needed lotion after every single shower because of her difficult, dry skin. Ali had just started putting it on all four kids once it became part of the redhead’s nightly routine. It had started one evening when the brunette had been too tired to think straight and all four kids were under the age of 6. Ali lotioned up Lily instead of Josie and didn’t realize her mistake until Josie started scratching at her itchy skin during storytime. Dr. Comello said it was good for all the kids so Ashlyn and Ali had adopted the practice for everybody.

Storytime started out ok with everybody huddled in Ali and Ashlyn’s big queen-sized bed. Maybe that had been their mistake. If they had kept storytime the way it usually went, either in Drew or Josie’s bedroom, maybe things wouldn’t have devolved so quickly. For once, Dodge hadn’t been the instigator. He got tired at night with his little body shutting down so it could power back up again in the morning. He curled up on Ali’s lap with his head resting on her chest as she lay flat on her back in her usual spot on the big bed. Ashlyn sat up against the headboard as she read a chapter of their current book, taking her time and making sure she spoke clearly and with the right tone for the story. Drew was sprawled out across the foot of the bed, on his left side with his head propped up in his hand near Ashlyn’s feet. Lily had beaten Josie to the prime spot between their two moms and the shit-eating grin on her face taunted both Josie and Drew as she looked triumphantly at them. That left Josie sitting in the middle of the bed, cross-legged with her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands. She didn’t seem bothered by the turn of events but the rest of her family knew she was ticked off and just trying not to admit it. It was the age-old ‘pretend you don’t want what you couldn’t have’ gambit and Josie did it better than almost anybody. Before long, the redhead had stretched out between her two mothers’ legs width-wise across the bed. She hammed it up and made it seem like she was really enjoying the spot with her head close enough to Ali that the brunette could reach down and play with her red hair as they all quietly listened to Ashlyn reading the story. Drew knew what was going on and didn’t fall for it, but Lily was increasingly intrigued by the new position and started watching her sister more than she was watching her Mama read their book. Neither mom was paying much attention to it or they would have put a stop to it before it happened. Finally Lily crawled away from the head of the bed and her comfy, cozy spot in the pillows between her two moms and laid down next to her sister, assuming the same pose. Josie didn’t waste a second. She hopped up and dove over Lily and into the vacated sweet spot with her own shit-eating grin.

“Hey, that’s my spot” Lily whined and sat up angrily.

“Not anymore” Josie countered carefully. “You left it and I took it. It was empty.”

Ashlyn and Ali looked at each other to see if either of them had an idea of how they wanted to handle the situation. The family rule used to be if you got up out of your spot, someone else could take it. But when the kids were younger and getting to the bathroom before having accidents became an important factor in the whole equation, they had changed the rule. Sometimes a child of theirs would stay in their spot even though they had a painfully full bladder, just so they wouldn’t lose the spot. Now the rule was you could keep your spot if you claimed it and said you were coming right back to it. And then you had to come right back to it. That had been another tweak after Drew started leaving for a half hour at a time and expecting his spot to still be there when he returned.

“Yeah but I called it” Lily whined with a trembling lip that they all knew meant trouble for sure.

“No you didn’t” Drew added nonchalantly and then yawned.

“Yes I did!” Lily turned angrily towards him and glared at him.

“No you didn’t” he repeated with a scowl, not appreciating the drama that had taken over storytime.

“Alright, everybody calm down” Ali put her hand out to rub Lily’s back to try and soothe her but the blonde girl angrily pushed it away.

“That’s enough young lady” Ashlyn spoke sternly to Lily which made the girl burst into tears.

“But it’s my spot...” she wailed and then leaned towards the head of the bed and took a swing at Josie, pure fury in her eyes.

“Hey!” Ali yelled as she grabbed Lily’s wrist and held it tightly. Dodge was half asleep on her lap so she couldn’t do much more than that from her prone position. “There is no hitting. I don’t care how upset you are.”

Lily wasn’t done though. She spun her butt around and flailed out with her legs, connecting her heel with Josie’s shin before Ashlyn could even react.

“Ow!” Josie’s face twisted into rage as she got on her knees and swung her own fist at Lily.

The keeper was ready for it though. Nobody kicked Josie without a retaliatory strike back. Nobody. Ashlyn dropped the book and pulled Josie into her lap and used her left arm to keep the two girls apart while Ali pulled Lily closer to her. Dodge sat up with a surprised look on his sleepy face and Drew chuckled from his spot at the foot of the bed. 

“Stop it! Right now!” Ashlyn yelled at Josie who was still trying her best to get out of the keeper’s grasp and go after her sister.

“But she kicked me!” 

“Because you stole her spot” Ashlyn countered, frustration filling her voice.

“But she left it!” 

“Ok, that’s enough for tonight” Ali’s voice carried louder than the bickering between the two girls. “Drew and Dodge go and get into bed please. Now” she left no doubt about how serious she was about what she wanted the boys to do and they both slid off the bed and walked slowly out of the room and into the hallway. Ali pulled Lily into her lap to stop her from kicking again, knowing Ashlyn had already taken an errant kick to her knee during the skirmish. “Do not move another muscle” she spoke evenly to the girl in her arms.

“Stop talking, right now” Ashlyn gave her own instructions to Josie who had stopped squirming but continued arguing.

The only sound in the room for a full minute was Lily crying and Josie breathing hard and fast. Both moms took deep breaths and shook their heads in amazement at each other. That’s just how fast things could change in the big old house when tired, cranky kids clashed.

“You are both going to be punished tomorrow” Ali spoke clearly, above Lily’s crying.

“But she took my spot” the youngest girl tried again.

“You’re being punished for hitting and kicking your sister” Ali explained to Lily who was sniveling and trying to catch her breath. “And you’re being punished for...” she paused as she turned her attention to Josie and then looked helplessly at her wife.

“For hitting your sister” Ashlyn finished for her and then shushed Josie again when she started to protest. “You would have hit her if I hadn’t stopped you. That counts and you know it does.”

Both moms wanted to punish Josie for baiting her sister into the altercation in the first place, but, technically, she hadn’t really done anything wrong. If Lily was gullible enough to fall for her sister’s machinations then there wasn’t too much they could do about it. Not in that setting anyway.

It took some time but once Ali brought Lily to her room and Ashlyn took Josie to her room, they both calmed down enough to go to bed. The two moms left the girls alone to think about things and settle down while they went and tucked in Drew and Dodge. They stopped back in Josie’s room first and settled her in for the night with goodnight hugs and kisses and sincere smiles among all three faces. They weren’t sure how they wanted to handle her yet so they just didn’t talk about it. Tomorrow would be soon enough. Finally they went into Lily’s room, the old guest room with the fireplace, and sat down on her bed with her. Her face was still pink and stained with tears but she had gotten herself into her bed and under her covers with one of the saddest looks ever on her face.

“You ok Sweetpea?” Ashlyn brushed the hair away from her face and kissed her forehead sweetly.

“She took my spot” Lily repeated in a very small and tired voice as she clutched her favorite stuffed pink flamingo, she owned four of them in varying sizes.

“Yes she did” Ali patted her little legs under the covers. “But you didn’t call your spot honey...”

“But...”

“Listen” Ali continued with a warm smile. “She tricked you sweetheart. There’s no other way to say it” she shrugged and gave the girl a sad frown. “It wasn’t very nice of her but she didn’t really break any rules...”

“Will she be punished though?” Lily asked, looking from one mom to the other.

“We’re not sure yet” Ashlyn answered honestly. “But we’re going to talk to her about it tomorrow for sure because we don’t like that behavior. It’s not nice.”

Just the fact that they had acknowledged that Lily had been wronged somehow, even though she had been the one who lost her temper and started hitting and kicking, made the girl shed the last bit of her anger. She took a few seconds and then her face changed back to her normal, easy-going visage right before their eyes. They both saw it and relaxed along with their youngest child.

“We’ll talk tomorrow about all of it. But for now you just go to sleep and have sweet dreams and get rested up for your very first basketball game...” Ashlyn started to wrap things up but Lily interrupted her.

“And practice too. We practice first, then play the game tomorrow morning, right?”

“That’s right honey” Ali smiled at the eager look on the girl’s tired face. “I can’t wait to watch you having fun out there.”

“Hey, can I tell you something that made me really proud and happy today?” Ashlyn’s eyes twinkled as she remembered that she wanted to say this to Lily before bedtime.

The girl nodded and looked curiously at her Mama.

“You were so nice and patient and kind with Becca this afternoon...”

“That’s right” Ali chimed in, glad her wife had remembered to bring it up. “You were awesome with her.”

“We just wanted to tell you how proud you made us Lily girl” Ashlyn kissed her again and got up off the bed. “Now go to sleep and get rested up ok?”

“Ok Mama” she smiled and tucked her stuffed flamingo under the covers with her. “I will.”

The keeper made sure everything was set in the room for the night while Ali gave her goodnight kisses and then they both went into the hallway and listened carefully to make sure everybody was still quiet and hopefully sleeping.

“Oh man, that was awful” Ali chuckled once they were back downstairs and cleaning up the kitchen.

“She’s so sweet and innocent and it breaks my heart to watch her go through that” Ashlyn groaned. 

“She’ll figure it out though babe, she’s smart. Josie won’t be able to fool her for very much longer.”

“I don’t even want to think about it anymore” the keeper shook her head and then her whole body as if that would help remove the storytime scene from her memory bank. “I just want to remember how sweet she was with Becca. That’s my Lily girl.”

“Yeah, that was pretty incredible. Let’s focus on that and not the hitting and kicking” Ali laughed softly and pulled her stressed out keeper into a big hug as they stood in the middle of the kitchen. “And remember how sweet she was this morning with the food drive?”

“Yes” Ashlyn nodded and exhaled loudly. “See, that’s our girl.”

“That’s right” the brunette agreed. “That’s our sweet girl.”

And they were both right. Lily’s good behavior far outweighed her occasional bad behavior but sometimes it was easy to forget that when she was having one of her bratty, diva episodes. But she wasn’t even 6 years old yet! It was hard to learn how to control your feelings and understand your emotions when you were so little. Upstairs, Lily had fallen asleep thinking about the unfinished chapter from storytime, worrying about getting hit in the face with the basketball the next morning like Josie had earlier in the week, and wondering if real live flamingos were as soft as the stuffed one under her arm. Those were the last, drowsy musings that night of an exhausted 5-1/2 year old Lilian Isabella Krieger.


	6. Weekends Aren't for Wimps

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey people. Happy Monday. So, clearly I wasn't able to get the last 3 chapters posted before I left for my trip yesterday. Sorry. The good news is I'm able to post while I'm away and working so....here we go.  
> This is the only chapter in this installment that isn't from one family member's perspective. I decided to give you a feel for the busy weekends of the Krieger family.

Saturdays for the Kriegers were kind of like a marathon. When Ashlyn or Ali was tired or sick it felt more like they were running a gauntlet. With four young kids all involved in sports and music and other different activities there was always something going on and usually at least two things overlapping at any given moment. The actual number of practices, games, rehearsals, and lessons that they had to attend varied from season to season during the school year and both Ali and Ashlyn were grateful that the next school play hadn’t started rehearsals yet. Sundays were busy too, but not quite as hectic as Saturdays always were. Drew had asked to play indoor soccer for the first time and neither mom could say no. They both worried that the kids’ schedules were too full and that there wasn’t enough time for them just to be kids. But they all genuinely enjoyed the activities that they signed up for. It wasn’t like the moms were pushing the kids into anything. It was almost the opposite sometimes.

“Are you sure you want to add indoor soccer to your schedule?” Ali challenged her oldest son that Saturday morning as they sat in the folding aluminum chairs of the little basketball gym watching Ashlyn and her assistant coach try to get Dodge and his 7 teammates to pass the ball to each other during the practice that preceded the game. “You can’t quit. You know that, right?”

“Yeah, I know” he spun the basketball with the ‘DK’ written in bold, black magic marker on it between his hands, just over his lap. “Almost everybody from the team is doing it, but they do the teams different” he shrugged. “I don’t know. I just hope our team doesn’t suck.”

The indoor soccer league was similar to the normal Fall soccer little league, but different too. There was a big facility farther North, almost to the NH border, about 30 miles away from Gloucester, and it had a huge main building and then a smaller, auxiliary building that was in a big outdoor field bubble for when they really needed two extra fields. The main building was made up of several smaller soccer fields, all using the improved type of turf that wasn’t toxic to the kids and was actually soft and supportive enough so it didn’t cause a bunch of extra injuries. Those fields comprised about 75% of the main building with a trampoline park business in the rest of it. There was a small concession stand area that sold hot dogs and chicken nuggets and pretzels and other things like that and an even smaller room that housed 4 older, out of date, stand-up video game machines. The whole thing was a genius plan, really. Families were often stuck there for hours at a time while they waited for a second game for one of their other children to start and there weren’t too many places nearby to venture off to, so they had you captive. But they gave you three other things you could pay for to fill your time. If you had more than one child and that other child wasn’t playing soccer or interested in watching soccer, you could take them over to the trampoline park, pay $10 and let them jump around for an hour. You could bring your kid to the video game room or let them eat all the crap they wanted while they waited for the soccering to be done. 

The only problem with the whole thing was the parking. The games were scheduled for an hour each and when you pulled into the parking lot to look for a space at 8:50am so your kid wouldn’t be late for his or her game, you were shit out of luck. But then at 9:05am half of the spots opened up. It was incredibly frustrating and Ashlyn threatened to just drive away once when she circled the huge parking area about 15 times and still couldn’t find a spot. The hard part about the indoor soccer that winter was making it work while all the other events were back down in Gloucester or neighboring Rockport. Sometimes the only way to make it work was the divide and conquer method and the Kriegers were old pros at that. It was disappointing though because neither Ashlyn nor Ali could physically watch and attend everything. And they wanted to. It pained each of them when they had to miss a game when two of them were played at the same time or at overlapping times. And the indoor soccer pulled at least one of them all the way up to the New Hampshire border and out of the local Gloucester loop entirely. But Drew wanted to play indoor soccer so they did it.

Ali decided not to coach it though. She killed herself during Fall soccer season and she didn’t want to do it again in the Winter. Additionally, Winter was Ashlyn’s coaching time and there was no way the family could survive if they both coached during the same season. That had been an unwritten, yet widely understood and accepted, rule since Josie’s first soccer season. It was interesting for the brunette to try and watch other people coach her kids at soccer. She had to bite her tongue a million times a game but there was no way she was going to be that insufferable little league parent. No freaking way. And, of course, once Drew asked to sign up for indoor soccer, Dodge wanted to do it too. There were no practices though, for any of the indoor teams, unless the coach was able to gather up his players and meet somewhere else locally. And that never happened. The kids were assigned to teams almost randomly with no regard to where they lived because everybody was driving up to the indoor facility anyway. It made an odd sort of sense even though everything about it, except for the game itself, felt different. The indoor soccer season started in mid-January and went until the end of March and you had to pay to join a team. Lily wasn’t interested in playing that first year because it wasn’t something she had been prepared for. She was surprised when Ali asked her about it and gave her a confused look as she said “No Mommy, soccer is for outside on the grass.” Josie declined the offer as well but only because the rehearsals for the play were starting in February and she was already going to be busy enough with that and basketball. Ashlyn laughed out loud and had to apologize to the redhead as she watched the girl actually purse her lips and furrow her brow while considering the idea very carefully. The keeper got a harsh look at the future when Josie gave her a withering glare after the apology. Ashlyn swore she was looking into her own wife’s face for a minute. She was sure she’d be seeing that face a lot more once Josie was in middle and high school. 

Saturday, January 13th, 2029 was cold and snowy and hectic as hell. The snow from the storm the day before was mostly just being blown around in the stiff wind that had followed after the storm had blown out to sea. But it was annoying and it stung when it hit you in the face. The basketball games were all played at the middle school because it had two gymnasiums after being renovated and expanded recently. The older, smaller gym was cleverly called the ‘little gym’ and it housed the small court that Drew had been playing on for the past several years with the aluminum chairs down the one side and the hallway where everybody mulled together waiting their turns and trying not to make more noise than the game being played on the actual court next to it. The new gym in the new addition to the school was called the ‘big gym’ and was a regulation high school size even though it was only a middle school. This was the gym that could be broken down into the smaller courts for practice like Josie had used on Tuesday evening. For the little league games, they divided the big court in the big gym into two halves to make two smaller courts that worked great for the little kids. Those two courts were only slightly smaller than the court in the little gym. The nicest thing about being in the big gym was that there were bleachers that spectators could sit in and enjoy the games.

The schedule for that Saturday went like this:

9:30am Dodge’s first basketball practice and game with Ashlyn as the head coach. Little Gym

10:30am Lily’s first basketball practice and game with Ashlyn as the head coach. Big Gym (half).

11:00am Drew’s basketball game, Ashlyn assistant coach. Little Gym.

1:30pm Josie’s basketball game, Ashlyn head coach. Little Gym.

3:00pm Boston Pride hockey game in Boston.

4:00pm Birthday party for one of Dodge and Lily’s classmates.

6:00pm Meg’s high school basketball game (available to stream).

The first conflict was Ashlyn coaching Lily’s game and not being able to go assistant coach Drew’s 11am game until her game was over at 11:30am. All of the coaches were good about those types of situations because almost every coach had their own kid on their team and had been dragged into the whole coaching experience for that very reason. Some coaches had more than one child and coached both of their teams. And some coaches, like Ashlyn, had three or four different coaching obligations that pulled them in multiple directions for practices all week, for the bigger kids, and then again on game days. Everybody understood and was patient and forgiving when the overlaps happened because it had happened to them before too. And if it hadn’t happened to them before it was only a matter of time before it would and everybody knew it. 

The non-coaching parent, in basketball season it was Ali, was in charge of any kids not playing or practicing with their team. This was often times more difficult than doing the actual coaching. That morning, for example, Josie was not pleased about having to be at the gym for Dodge’s 9:30am practice/game. The redhead didn’t have her game until 1:30pm and would have four full hours to kill. Ali felt bad for her kids when that happened, but it was just how things worked for their family. Josie was 7-1/2 years old and there was no way they were leaving her home alone for 3-1/2 hours. Occasionally Ashlyn or Ali was able to schedule a play date in situations like that, or like Dodge was going to experience after his game. He would be finished at 10:30am and unable to go home until after Josie’s game ended at 2:30pm, another four-hour stretch of idle time. That Saturday morning Josie was lucky enough to go hang out at Kayla’s house and even eat lunch there instead of hanging out at the middle school. Kayla’s mom Pam would bring her to Kayla’s game with them and Josie could rejoin the Krieger clan at that point. The trick to those types of social events was making sure the guest child remembered his or her sports bag all along the way.

“Jose, listen to me, please” Ali beseeched her daughter earlier that morning as they were all getting ready for their busy Saturday. “Am I putting your basketball uniform in your bag for you or are you going to wear it now?” the brunette put her hand on her hip and quirked her eyebrow at her daughter after asking her the same question for the third time. “Because I’m about to go and help somebody else get ready and then y0u’ll have to make sure you have everything you need all by yourself...”

“No Mommy” Josie sighed heavily, got off of her bed where she had been sitting and putting stickers in one of her activity books, and walked to the extra twin bed at the front of the room where Ali was trying to pack her bag. “I don’t want to wear it all day” she shook her head, picked up the pile of small green t-shirt, and black athletic shorts that Ali had just folded, and shoved them roughly into the bag. “I’ll change at Kayla’s before we leave for the game” she reached for the short white sports socks but wasn’t able to get them in the bag before Ali interrupted her.

“Ok, thank you for answering me” the brunette nodded and exhaled as she took the socks out of Josie’s hand. “We’re not doing multiple pairs of shoes today” she shook her head and put the socks back on the bed next to the leggings and sweater that Josie had picked out to wear to her friend’s house. “You wear your basketball socks with your sneakers to Kayla’s. And make sure you remember to bring your water bottle...”

“I will” Josie patted her mother’s leg and leaned against it, resting her head on Ali’s hip. “Kayla’s mom always asks me if I have it.”

The redhead knew she was on thin ice after the storytime debacle the night before. Her mothers had just finished talking with her about her part in the fight with Lily and explaining exactly what they didn’t like about her behavior. Josie had truly seemed contrite, especially when she learned that her parents were trying to decide whether or not she would still be allowed to go to Kayla’s that morning or not. She hugged Ali’s leg in an honest gesture of appreciation for being allowed to keep her play date with her bestie. The punishment for both girls had been stipulated at the end of both discussions that morning. They would not be allowed to enjoy the trampoline park tomorrow while the family watched Drew and Dodge play their indoor soccer games. It was effective punishment because all four kids loved to bounce in those places. It was something they all agreed on and played well on together. And the girls would have to abstain while Dodge jumped during Drew’s game and then Drew jumped during Dodge’s game. 

“I don’t want you to have to rely on Kayla’s mom all the time honey” Ali hugged the girl to her leg and played with her hair as they stood together in the sweet moment. “You know what you need for your game and I want you to make sure you have it with you before you leave their house. Got it?”

“Ah-huh” she nodded and smiled up at the brunette. “My uniform, my sneakers – but I’ll already have them on, and my water bottle” she nodded after each item.”

“And don’t forget to put your other clothes back in the bag...”

“Oh yeah, I forgot” she tilted her head all the way back, dramatically, hanging onto Ali’s upper thigh for support and throwing her mom off balance for a few seconds at the shift in weight. “Mommy!” she yelled and clutched at Ali’s leg harder when she felt like she was going to fall for those couple of seconds.

“Stand up!” Ali snapped, annoyed at the inadvertent stressful moment. “I love the hugs, but I don’t like...”

“When we hang all over you” Josie finished her complaint for her and stood up straight, keeping one hand where it was on the back of Ali’s thigh.

“So you know it bothers me and you’re still doing it” Ali sighed and squeezed her daughter against her leg again. 

She was partly apologizing for snapping at her and partly getting another hug in before the rest of the day swept them up in its madness. Both Ashlyn and Ali, and almost every parent they knew, despised being used as a jungle gym by their kids. It was one thing when they were much smaller. But as they got bigger it was harder to support their weight in all of the strange positions and in all of the unscheduled instances. One time Niki had thrown her back out when 7 year old Evan had done something every kid seemed unable to stop doing – hanging on their parent unannounced and with their full body weight. 

“Alright little one, get dressed” she bent over and kissed Josie’s head. “It’s almost time for us to leave” she patted the girl’s bum and smiled as she watched her start to take her pajamas off. “You might want to bring a book too, just in case.”

“I always do” she replied with her head inside her pajama top.

“That’s my girl” Ali smiled brightly at her. “Oh, and don’t forget your barrettes or you won’t be able to see the ball” she added before moving on to the next kid in her quest to make sure everybody was dressed and ready to go.

Entertaining Dodge, or rather keeping him out of trouble, for the four hours after his game that morning was a bigger challenge for the brunette. Ken and Vicki came to as many games as they possibly could, which was a lot now that Ken was retired. They were always excellent helpers when it came to keeping track of the kids on those long mornings at the gym or the soccer fields. Ali and Dodge moved into the little gym at 11am to watch the beginning of Drew’s game while Ken and Vicki stayed behind to watch Lily’s game. Teaching 5-1/2 year old girls how to play basketball was easily one of the most challenging things Ashlyn had ever done. She loved it but it drove her crazy at the same time, all in good ways. All of the girls were excited for their very first basketball practice and then their very first basketball game and the adorable level was very very high that morning. Dodge’s team had been just as excited but they exhibited it so differently than the girls did. The boys let the energy fill their bodies and they seemed determined to channel it into the game itself. They ran faster and threw the ball harder and dribbled more aggressively as they ran up and down the court with very little idea of where they were going or what they were supposed to be doing. The only reason they even looked like they were playing basketball was because Ashlyn and her assistant coach were shouting instructions and encouragement at them constantly. 

The girls, on the other hand, ran around excitedly too, but they did so like little faeries. They flitted around each other and giggled and laughed nervously as their emotions ran wild. Ashlyn was amazed. She had noted the difference before, when she had first coached Josie’s team. It had been very different than her experience coaching Drew’s team and in many of the same ways she was observing that Saturday with Dodge and Lily’s teams. At the time she had just chalked it up to Josie being extra small and Drew’s team just being more used to sports. She thought the difference in the kids’ personalities had more to do with it than anything. But now with Dodge and Lily showing the same differences, she had to change the way she was thinking about it. Ashlyn had never once taught either of her daughters to ‘flit’ around the court. She had taught all of her kids to run the same way. She didn’t remember Ali having a similar experience on the soccer teams either. What was it about basketball that made the girls so...girlie? Was it the enclosed space? The loud, echo-chamber of the gymnasium? Was it that they were genuinely more afraid of the basketball than they were of the soccer ball? It was absolutely something she wanted to think about and talk about with her wife and their friends. She didn’t have any answers yet but she definitely wanted to find some, and soon. There was no way Ashlyn Michelle Harris Krieger was going to be perpetuating any gender-based sports ability or inclination bullshit. No fucking way. 

But for that day, that first day of little league basketball for her two youngest kids, Ashlyn laughed along with the girls and tried to make sure they had fun while they were learning to play their newest sport. And with Dodge’s team, the keeper spent her time making sure nobody got hurt as the boys bounced around each other like those ping pong balls in the air chambers that they used to draw the winning lottery numbers from every night. 

After Drew’s game the Kriegers, along with Ken and Vicki, made the ten-minute drive back to the big old house for lunch and to let the dogs out. They had an hour to spend there before they had to go back to the middle school for Josie’s 1:30pm game. 

“Do we have to all go?” Drew whined when it was time to get back into the minivan at 1:15pm.

“I don’t know why you think I would miss your sister’s game when I’ve already watched all of the rest of yours” Ali challenged from the driver’s seat, turning around to look at her oldest son as he climbed into the vehicle. 

“But why can’t I stay here with Grandpa?” he tried again.

“Because he wants to watch Josie’s game too” Ashlyn answered from outside the minivan and lightly smacked Drew’s butt as it moved slowly into the vehicle. “You’re going so just zip it.”

Lily and Dodge giggled at both the playful swat and the surprised look on their brother’s face as he took his seat and secured his seatbelt. Ashlyn pushed the button to close the sliding door and told the kids back there that she would see them at the school.

“Have everything you need?” Ali asked after she rolled the window down and her wife moved to lean in through it and give her lips a sweet kiss.

“I could use some more of that” Ashlyn spoke quietly so the kids didn’t hear her over the sound of the DVD playing on the screen just behind the two front seats.

Ali rolled her eyes but couldn’t keep the smile from her face as her wife’s words had the desired effect. She leaned towards the window and gave Ashlyn a kiss of her own, smiling into it and letting herself float away for 5 seconds. A car horn honked behind them to break it up and they both looked to see Ken laughing from behind the wheel of it. Vicki was shaking her head at him and waving apologetically at the two harried moms as Ken started to back the car out of the driveway.

“Why’s Grandpa honking at us?” Dodge asked, confused.

“Because they were kissing” Drew replied matter of factly, never taking his eyes off of the DVD player.

Both Dodge and Lily looked confused again and Ali thought about explaining...something to them but then decided to just let it go. They didn’t always have to understand everything. They were only 5-1/2.

“So you have everything?” she asked her wife again instead.

“Yeah, I’m all set. We’ll get there a little late but it’ll just have to be ok” she shrugged.

“I wish we were all going” Ali said wistfully. “Say hi to everybody for us.”

“I do too” Ashlyn answered her first statement and then her second. “And I will.” They shared one last, quick kiss in the chilly driveway. “And if I forget to say it later, have fun at the party.”

“We always do” Ali laughed as she rolled the window up and watched the love of her life get into her Jeep.

“Can I go with Mama?” Drew asked, all of a sudden remembering what the plan was.

“No. Not now, it’s too late” Ali said as she backed down the driveway.

“Pleeeeaaase?” he begged shamelessly.

Ali considered it for a second but when she saw Dodge start to contemplate the move too she nixed it. They had already spent three extra minutes kissing in the driveway and she didn’t want to be late for Josie’s game.

“No. We’re already on our way. You’ll live without her for ten minutes until you see her again” she laughed and was happy to hear the kids, even Drew, join her.

Josie had managed to get there on time, thank you Pam and Kayla, with her uniform looking good and her bag and her water bottle and a smile on her eager little face. Her top lip was still a little swollen but the cut on the inside had healed up nicely since she took the basketball to the face at practice Tuesday evening. She had even tried to put her barrettes into her hair by herself and Ali grinned widely as she watched Ashlyn and Josie on the court. The keeper removed the barrettes and redid them for the girl so they would actually stay in place for an hour. Josie’s red hair was so thin that it could be challenging to get barrettes or clips to stay in place for very long.

“Everything ok?” Ali asked Pam as they sat next to each other in the little gym with Dodge and Lily perched on Ken and Vicki’s laps on the other side of the brunette.

“Yes, why? Is she not wearing something she was supposed to?” Pam answered and furrowed her brow to think of what they might have left behind.

“No, no” Ali chuckled. “I just mean with her, this morning. Was she ok for you?” she asked, knowing her bossy girl could be a handful for anybody if she got herself in just the right mood.

“Oh she was great. She always is” Pam smiled back. 

“Well we both know that’s not true” Ali laughed again as they watched the beginning of the game. “She wasn’t too pushy or anything?” her laughter masked how anxious she really was about Josie’s sometimes overbearing nature.

“No” Pam shook her head. “She was great. They were both good, I promise.”

As soon as the game ended Ashlyn ran to the bathroom and changed from her coach’s track pants, sweatshirt and sneakers into a pair of nice jeans, a comfy but stylish sweater and a pair of black boots to complete the look. She went over to her family and hugged and kissed everybody goodbye and then told Drew to carry the bag of basketballs to the Jeep with them. Ali had helped Josie change back into her outfit from before the game and then waved goodbye to Ashlyn, Drew and Josie as they hurried out of the middle school as fast as they could without running people over. 

“I wanna go too” Dodge said sadly, his big blue eyes blinking after the trio as they exited the little gym on their way to the 3:00pm Boston Pride hockey game in Boston.

The Kriegers and Knight-Harris Co had a luxury box at Boston Garden too so they could attend Bruins, Celtics, Pride and Beacons games as often as possible. Several of the Pride hockey players from back when Ashlyn was playing soccer and Hilary Knight was playing hockey had gathered for a reunion weekend. They were all attending the Pride game that afternoon and then going out to dinner afterwards. Spouses and families were invited since they almost all had a husband, wife or kids.

“But then you’d miss Peter’s birthday party” Ali reminded him with a grin and a wink.

“Oh yeah” his face broke into a big smile at the thought.

“Mommy! Mommy!” Lily tugged on Ali’s arm and practically hopped up and down. “We forgot his presents!” 

“No sweetie, we’re going home first so we can change out of basketball clothes and we’ll bring his presents with us then, remember?” Ali calmed her daughter and winked at her father who was standing there with a huge smile on his face, enjoying every minute of his extended time with his grandkids that day.

“Pizza! We’re having pizza at the party aren’t we Mommy?” Dodge asked excitedly, remembering the details of the party that both his mothers had explained to them several times over the past few days.

“You’re going to make your own pizzas! I can’t wait to see how they turn out” Ali’s eyes went wide, matching the energy and excitement levels of the twins. “Let’s go home and get ready, ok?”

The Boston Pride game was fun and many of the players who had played with Hilary Knight back in those early days of the NWHL around 2015 were in attendance for a reunion. Many of those women had spent a lot of time at the big old house hanging out with Ashlyn and Ali as they all grew to be good friends on and off the ice. These were the gals who had taught Ashlyn how to skate so she could surprise her wife that Christmas on the Frog Pond near Boston Common. They were all thrilled to see both Drew and Josie looking so big and grown up. The kids were happy to see Carmelina Moscato who had come with her wife and former Boston Pride player Kacey Bellamy. Carm was one of the Krieger kids’ favorite babysitters, as was Kacey, and Carm was just as happy to see Drew and Josie at the game that afternoon too.

The birthday party had also been a big success, as skeptical as many of the other mothers had been when they heard Peter’s brave and crazy parents were going to encourage and allow 19 5-year old kids to make their own pizzas in their kitchen. Both Dodge and Lily had a blast constructing their very own, personal-size, pizza. Lily even ate most of hers when it was time to enjoy the fruits of their labor for dinner just before the end of the party.

“So what did Dodge put on his pizza?” Ashlyn asked with a chuckle as she cozied up with her wife on the couch in the family room that night. They were sitting still for what felt like the first time all day and even enjoying a glass of wine each. “Did he really put mushrooms on there?” she asked in disbelief.

“He did” Ali nodded and giggled as she played idly with the short hair at the back of her wife’s neck from her spot next to her on the couch. She was sitting sideways on the couch with her legs up over Ashlyn’s lap and her glass of wine in her left hand. Ashlyn moved her hand slowly along the brunette’s legs, randomly massaging a calf here and a thigh there as they talked about their afternoons and evenings. “But it was only, like, four of them and he carefully ate his way around them until Peter’s mom told him he could just take them off if he wanted.”

“I’ll bet he was psyched about that” Ashlyn laughed.

They had already talked about the Pride game and all the former players who had assembled and how Carm had gotten Ali on Facetime so she could say hi to everybody before the game ended. And they were just finishing up the details about Peter’s birthday party. 

“Did you talk to Meg tonight?” Ali asked after a placid, quiet moment, only the faint sounds of SportsCenter playing softly on the tv. “How was her game?”

“Good!” Ashlyn couldn’t contain the excitement in her voice, even though she was tired as hell. “They won and she looked really good out there.”

“Oh did you watch the stream?” the brunette perked up, excited that her wife might have been able to watch Meg’s basketball game down in Washington DC at some point during her afternoon and early evening in Boston with Drew and Josie. “I was hoping you’d be able to but I wasn’t sure the timing would work.”

Meg’s high school was in Tenleytown, a wealthy neighborhood of Washington DC, and there was a stream program available for purchase if any of the parents wanted to watch their kids during their travels for work. Many people who lived in the DC area had government jobs or positions with companies who had lucrative government contracts so there was always lots of travel for many of the parents. Ashlyn had jumped at the chance to finally watch Meg’s games in real time instead of always after the fact. If they could make it work, they would stream one of her games on the big screen tv at the big old house and the whole family would watch. The kids’ interest waned but they always tuned back in after taking a break to color or draw or work on a puzzle while they were all hanging out together in the front living room.

“I didn’t think it would work out but we got to the restaurant with everybody after the game and Hilary, Carm, Kacey and I watched it on my phone. It was a 6pm start so it worked great. By the time we were done eating and catching up, the game was over and I called Meggie on our drive home. Well, we all did” Ashlyn beamed at the memory and leaned in for a kiss from her wife.

“Was she excited? Did they have her playing the 4 again or the 3?”

“She was very happy” Ashlyn’s dimple appeared in another big grin. “She was a little bummed because Coach Ricks had her play the 3 again, even though she doesn’t have that perimeter shot. She missed a few shots from out there and you could see her get more disappointed after each one” she looked down as she remembered watching Meg’s shoulders slump more and more after each missed shot.

“Why won’t she play her at the 4? She’s so good there” Ali frowned. “She’s good without the ball and she moves well around the key and she boxes out better than most of the other girls on the whole team” the brunette stated the case for her tall and talented step-daughter.

“I think she’s afraid Meg’s not strong enough to body up some of the bigger and taller centers the other teams have. I don’t know what else she can do to prove it to her.”

“She’s already played so well for her in that spot though” Ali shook her head again. “Doesn’t she ever watch them work out or anything? How can she not know how strong Meg is?”

“I don’t know baby” the keeper sighed heavily and lifted her tired eyes up to meet her favorite whiskey-colored ones. “But she scored some baskets and faked one girl right out of her shoes for fuck’s sake. She was pretty happy.”

“When’s her next game? I think she’s got some time off...”

“A week from Monday” Ashlyn’s smile got even brighter when she thought about what else was happening on Monday, January 22nd. “Your big night.”

“How is it the third week of January already?” the brunette rolled her eyes and sighed.

“Well it’s not really” Ashlyn corrected her with a silly, sweet grin. “It’s the second week of January...”

“Oh, you know what I mean” Ali lightly pinched the skin at the back of her wife’s neck to punish her for being so literal, especially about something that she knew Ali was nervous about in the first place.

“Ow!” the keeper jumped at the pinch and almost spilled the fragrant red wine all over them both in the process. “Ok, ok, you’re right. I know what you mean” she chuckled and then moaned softly when she felt Ali’s fingers dancing all over the back of her neck trying to soothe the hurt she had just caused.

“You know I’m all in my head about it” Ali quirked her eyebrow at the keeper and then ducked her head down shyly.

“I know you are sugarplum” Ashlyn put their glasses of wine on the coffee table so she could pull her wife closer and hug her properly. “You’re gonna be great. They’re smart to finally give you that award. You should have won it years ago” she praised her wife sincerely.

Ali had won the city of Cambridge’s prestigious ‘Businesswoman of the Year’ for 2028 and she was going to be presented the award after giving a speech at the annual kick-off meeting for 2029 on January 22nd. She had done some public speaking before and given a few speeches and talks over the years, mostly to encourage young female entrepreneurs in Boston and Cambridge, but she still got really nervous about them. She did a nice job and could pull them off, but it was not easy for her. Public speaking wasn’t second nature for her as it was for her wife. Ali had to work at it to be successful.

“Yeah, right” the brunette giggled shyly. “Not like you’re biased or anything.”

“Hey, you’re hot right now baby” Ashlyn’s face lit up at the opportunity to talk about Ali’s recent brush with big-time fame. She had been the subject of a trending social media post the week before Christmas. “It has nothing to do with me or my bias.”

“Oh stop” Ali blushed and tucked her head under her wife’s chin, nuzzling into her neck and cuddling into her.

“If I didn’t know better I’d say they gave you that award just because of that viral video of you kicking my ass at the Christmas party” Ashlyn laughed out loud, loving the whole idea.

“Yeah, too bad they had already notified me about the award a week before the Christmas party” Ali laughed back, took a beat, and then pressed a warm, lingering kiss into Ashlyn’s neck.

The Knight-Harris Christmas party that December, almost exactly one month ago to the day, had been bigger than all of the previous parties because they were celebrating their 10th year in business. There were a lot more people in attendance and Ali had pulled out all the stops to make sure it was fun and memorable for all of their employees and clients alike. There were several different games brought into the expansive hotel ballroom where they had held the party. At one point towards the end of the evening, Ali and Whitney teamed up to whip Ashlyn and Hilary’s asses at a game of ping pong. It wasn’t anything unusual – Ali had been smoking most of them at various party games as long as they had known her, but what they didn’t realize was that one of their employees had filmed the whole thing and posted clips of it on their Instagram account for all the world to see. The employee hadn’t tagged anybody in the posts and had meant it mostly for other employees to enjoy. But Ashlyn and Hilary’s fans were quick to tag their heroes and tags for Whitney and Ali weren’t far behind. All four women in the video were a little buzzed after a fun night of celebrating and eating and drinking and dancing, but none of them were drunk or doing anything that would embarrass themselves or the company. The employee, one of the young, talented lawyers Whitney had continued to hire, posted the three separate videos in the same post and used the following hashtags: #bestplacetoworkever #girlpower #aliisbetterthaneverybodyelse #pleasedon’tfiremeWhitney? #K-H10yearsgoingstrong 

The text of her actual post read: “These are the badass bitches who run my company!”

Ali was viral video famous for the two weeks before Christmas and then again early in the new year when the announcement had been made about her winning the Businesswoman of the Year award. Nobody was happier about the turn of events than Ashlyn. She knew how amazing her wife was and she often bemoaned the fact that Ali never got the credit she deserved for so many things in their life – her trailblazing work at Knight-Harris not the only place where her star should have shone brighter than everybody else’s.

“I can’t wait to listen to your speech, and watch you up on that stage getting some of the credit you deserve. Finally” Ashlyn stated with conviction and tilted her wife’s face up so she could give her a kiss.

“Mmmmmm...” Ali hummed into the kiss and closed her eyes. “You’re sweet and I love you.”

“I love you too, my superstar” Ashlyn murmured into Ali’s mouth as the kiss deepened and their hands started to explore.

The keeper was exhausted and she didn’t really think she had enough energy for sex that night, which was unusual. Ashlyn was normally the one who never said no. Not that Ali said no very often either, but the brunette fell asleep at night faster than either of them really wanted so her unconsciousness said no for her sometimes. There were nights where Ashlyn gave her wife an orgasm and then they both fell asleep as they enjoyed the closeness of the post-orgasmic bliss. Ali always woke up feeling like the shittiest wife in the world and made quick work of repaying the favor – she would be forever grateful for the fact that her keeper didn’t mind being woken up for sex. The brunette couldn’t imagine how they would have survived if Ashlyn hadn’t been flexible and accommodating in that one particular way. Falling asleep right after making Ali come was also breaking their rule about getting dressed again and unlocking the door after they had sex. It didn’t happen very often, but it did happen. They were only human and they were busy, working moms who were tired as fuck by the end of most days. They knew it would change soon enough though. It was easy to see that they would get more of their own time back when they looked at how independent Drew was becoming already. Soon all four kids would be able to make their own breakfast, or at least find their own breakfast and put it in the toaster or microwave or cereal bowl. They’d be making their own decisions about how to structure their afternoons and evenings while still getting their homework done, instruments practiced and sports skills honed soon too. Soon enough. For now, they were still young enough to need their moms for almost everything, and, even though it left them tired and cranky sometimes, Ali and Ashlyn wouldn’t change a thing. 

They made out slowly on the couch, taking their time and not letting things get too heated. They both knew they had another whole day of activities to get through on Sunday and weren’t keen on starting the day even more exhausted than normal. They relied on having a night or two a week where they crashed early and got caught up on some sleep, just to survive. They had already blown that up earlier in the week when Ali’s grand beach-themed gesture kept them up extra late Tuesday night. On average, Ashlyn and Ali had sex about twice a week. There were some weeks where they only found time and energy for one romp, but when they thought about it, those weeks made both of them a little sad and a lot disappointed. They tried hard not to make a big deal out of it, instead focusing on the next week and making sure not to be disappointed two weeks in a row. It was something that they had even talked about with Mattie during their occasional shared therapy sessions. She had encouraged them to keep talking openly and honestly about what their individual needs were, in and out of the bedroom. But she challenged them specifically to not become complacent just because they had been having sex together for 13 years.

“So many couples come to me and tell me that they’re afraid to change anything because it had always worked for them before” Mattie had explained at their last joint appointment in November. “it’s the age-old, ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ conundrum” she grinned and then sighed. “I completely agree that you shouldn’t start looking for problems that don’t exist”, she looked knowingly at Ali, “but I’m all for keeping things fresh and exciting in all areas of your relationship.”

Both Ali and Ashlyn nodded, their cheeks slightly pink as they blushed. It was a normal reaction for them anytime their therapist brought up their sex lives, whether it was during a solo appointment or a joint one. The brunette had caught their therapist’s look and knew that Mattie was well aware of Ali’s penchant for finding things to worry about. She had gotten better about it in some ways over the years, but adding the kids to the complex balance inside her mind had been challenging to say the least. It was very hard for Ali not to obsess about possible worries when it came to the kids.

“Would you eat the same three foods for dinner every night of your life for 13 years?” Mattie pressed on, not surprised by the shy silence she got in return.

Ashlyn laughed out loud after a few seconds, unable to stop herself.

“Come on doc” she grinned even though her cheeks were still pink. “I’ve got more than three moves. Gimme a little credit, will ya?”

“Ashlyn” Ali chastised with a whisper-yell, keeping her eyes down as her own cheeks turned bright red.

“What?” the keeper squeezed her wife’s hand as they sat next to each other on the therapist’s couch as they had dozens of times over the past 13 years. “I didn’t say what they were or which ones were your favorite” Ashlyn teased with a wink and got a horrified gasp in return from her wife.

“I’m just trying to put it in perspective for you” Mattie continued, knowing better than to allow Ali’s embarrassment to grow by dwelling on it any longer than she had to. “And, for the record, I’m pretty sure you two have this one figured out” she chuckled. “But I never assume so you’re getting the check-in talk I give all my happily married couples.”

“See, it’s not even about us” Ashlyn lifted her wife’s hand up off the couch and squeezed it within both of her own large ones. “She’s been shy about sex since the very first time I met her” the keeper turned her attention back to the therapist and grinned widely at the memory of the shy, inexperienced Ali Krieger she had fallen in love with all those years ago.

“None of which is germane to the point I’m trying to make” Mattie gave Ashlyn a look that told her to stop making things worse for the brunette, and then returned her grin.

“Don’t be afraid to try new things. Gotta spice it up sometimes. Got it. Can we move on now?” Ali’s voice interrupted the two smiling women who seemed so amused by her discomfort.

“Yes we can move on” the therapist nodded. “I just want to say that some couples who are perfectly happy are afraid to try anything new because of a fear of change. And the point I’m trying to make is that even if you are enjoying a robust and fulfilling sex life with your spouse, you should try not to be afraid of upsetting the apple cart. Take some risks and try some new things even if you’re perfectly content with the way things are. Don’t fall into the trap of paralyzing perfection.”

“What’s that?” Ali’s head lifted at the therapist’s words.

“Sometimes couples who are very happy stop growing and changing and exploring – and I’m not talking just about in the bedroom” she raised her eyebrows to caution them both. “They become paralyzed by the perfection they’ve found. They focus on maintaining their perceived perfection and end up choking the life out of their relationship in the process. They stop living and growing and thriving. And they have made their own fear come to be at the same time.”

“Jesus, that’s a cheerful thought” Ashlyn raised her eyebrows at Mattie and sighed heavily.

“It’s a cautionary tale my friends” Mattie chuckled. “Don’t worry about it too much” she looked directly at Ali who was chewing on her bottom lip. “It’s just something to try and think about from time to time if you find yourselves getting stuck.”

“Suddenly I feel like I need to take some cooking classes” Ashlyn deadpanned, making both women laugh and easing the tension that had filled the room.

The memory of that therapy session pushed its way into Ashlyn’s brain as she relaxed on the couch that night with her wife in her arms. She tried to use it to her own advantage and get her mind and body to wake up and come to life again. The wine had been her downfall though and she knew it. She knew Ali loved it when she drank wine with her but it affected her more than it did the brunette. Perhaps it was just that Ashlyn’s system was more accustomed to her whiskey than the wine. Whatever the reason, as soon as the keeper had a glass of wine she could be counted on to fall asleep fairly quickly thereafter. 

“Let’s go to bed babe” Ali whispered after taking a break to catch their breath. Her lips were working their way up Ashlyn’s neck and the keeper groaned in reply. But it wasn’t the kind of groan that accompanied their sexy times. It was a grumpy, tired, frustrated groan instead.

“I’m so tired honey, I shouldn’t have had the wine...I can’t keep my eyes open...” she started to explain apologetically, frustration spiking up behind her sleepy eyes.

“It’s ok, I know” Ali giggled and gave her wife another slow kiss, letting her tongue convince her that all was well before trying with words. “I meant go to bed and go to sleep” she explained carefully as she slowly placed gentle kisses to the blonde’s cheeks and forehead and nose and eyelids. “I’m exhausted too. It’s been a long week...” Ali tried to reassure her some more.

“But I really want to take you to bed...” Ashlyn complained adorably, making the brunette giggle again.

“Babe, you might think you want that, but I don’t think you’re even going to make it upstairs at all if we don’t go right this second” she moved away from her keeper and started to stand up.

“Nooo...don’t go” Ashlyn pouted and grabbed onto Ali’s wrist as the brunette got to her feet.

“Come with me you big goofball” Ali chuckled, amused by her big baby of a wife. Truthfully, it was usually she who was the one being half-dragged upstairs by the keeper before completely crashing wherever they had been relaxing together downstairs. “Come on, get up and let’s go to sleep” she tugged Ashlyn’s arms and pulled her into a standing position in front of her. She kissed the pouty lips in front of her before leading her by the hand to the bottom of the backstairs. “Go on and I’ll be up in a few minutes.”

“You said you’d come with me...” she whined and even stamped her foot a bit which was a sure sign of just how tired she really was. 

“I’m gonna let the dogs out and I’ll be right up. I promise. Now go on” Ali gave her wife a little push towards the first step and patted her butt before turning her attention to putting the house to bed for the night.

“Mmmmmmm” Ashlyn hummed contentedly when she felt her wife finally get into bed fifteen minutes later and wrap her body behind her as the big spoon. “There she is...I love you baby.”

“I love you too” Ali pressed a kiss into her keeper’s shoulder and snuggled in closer, loving how warm the bed and her wife already were. “Mmmmm, you feel good” she sighed and yawned as they settled into place together.

“If we get some sleep tonight, maybe we can have some fun in the morning” Ashlyn yawned in reply and held Ali’s hand up high near her chest as they spooned.

“Sounds great” the brunette answered sleepily as they both drifted quickly off to sleep.

As much as they both wanted it to happen, they also knew that it probably wouldn’t. Dodge would be in their room at 6:30am and that would be that. But the seed had been planted and both women would spend much of the next day looking forward to having sex Sunday night instead. It would be one of those days where they found each other across whatever room or gym or field they were in and exchanged knowing, anticipatory looks. Unless one of them had been sick, they had never postponed sex for a night and then not kept their bedroom ‘date’ the next night. There was no reason to think Sunday night would be the first time.

Sunday was busy but not nearly as busy as Saturday had been and it started early with Dodge climbing into bed with his two mommies at 6:45am. It was rare for him to find Ali still in bed and he made a beeline for her side of the bed for some sleepy snuggles. 

The schedule for Sunday looked like this:

10:00am Drew’s indoor soccer game.

1:00pm Dodge’s indoor soccer game.

4:00pm Four-Family early dinner at the Dwyer’s house.

 

All six of the Kriegers piled into the minivan with soccer bags and all of the accoutremont that was required for spending five hours away from home. They made the 30-minute drive up to the indoor soccer facility near the New Hampshire border and watched Drew’s soccer game at 10am. Ken and Vicki joined them again and were quickly brought up to speed on the girls’ no-trampoline park punishment. Ashlyn was shocked when she heard Lily ask her Grandpa if he would take her to the trampoline park. The little girl thought she was being crafty, waiting until both of her mothers were out of earshot. But Ashlyn rounded the corner and surprised Lily while she was taking Dodge to the bathroom.

“Lilian Isabella Krieger” the keeper spoke seriously and stood still with her hand on Dodge’s upper arm, holding him in place too. “Did you just ask Grandpa to take you to the trampoline park?”

“It’s ok Ashlyn...” Ken tried to diffuse a situation that he had no idea was as big as it really was.

“Do not lie to me young lady” the keeper stared hard at her daughter and ignored Ken for the moment.

“Ummmm...no, not really” Lily laughed nervously and glanced up at Ken, willing him not to sell her out. “I mean, I...I...I...” she stammered, her old stutter coming back because she knew she was in hot water, “I was only kidding” she lied.

Dodge swallowed hard and looked up at Ken who had by now realized there was a lot more going on than he was aware of. Ashlyn was a level of angry that she didn’t usually reach and both kids knew whatever happened next was not going to be good. The keeper clenched her jaw and took a deep breath to calm herself down.

“Both Lily and Josie are being punished today so they aren’t allowed to go to the trampoline park. No matter what they say” Ashlyn explained tersely to Ken who nodded.

“Mama, I have to pee” Dodge reminded her as he shifted his weight and did his best to stand still even though his bladder felt like it was about to burst.

“Got it” Ken nodded again and gave the keeper a warm, understanding smile. “Why don’t I take him to the bathroom” he reached for Dodge’s hand and the two were off like a shot, eager to get away from the trouble brewing between Ashlyn and Lily.

“There you are” Ali said breathlessly as she came around the corner a few seconds later. “You’re missing it! Drew scored a goal!” her face was full of her nose-crinkling grin as she motioned for her wife to come and join them. “Come on.”

Ashlyn didn’t have the heart to ruin the moment for her beautiful brunette.

“Go ahead, get back there” the keeper gave her a smile. “We’ll be right there in a minute.”

“What’s the matter?” Ali’s mood changed instantly as she looked at her daughter’s guilty face and realized that Ashlyn had left with Dodge and was now standing with Lily instead. “What happened?”

It was tough to keep anything hidden from either mom after almost 10 years of parenting. The keeper filled Ali in, Lily cried when it became obvious that both of her moms knew she had not been just kidding with her Grandpa, and Ken quietly walked Dodge back past them after their bathroom break to join Vicki and Josie who were around the corner watching Drew’s game.

“Well, now you can sit here and watch the soccer games without your iPad or books” Ashlyn lowered the boom, but stopped short of stripping her of her stuffed flamingo. “We will let you get your water bottle out of your bag, but that’s it. Now stop crying and go sit down” she pointed towards the bench the rest of their family was sitting on.

“Or you can cry if you want to, but you’re still going to sit here with us and think about why you’re being punished” Ali added when Lily burst into tears.

Dodge poked his head around the corner. He wanted to check on his sister, not really understanding what had happened, but more importantly he wanted to go jump at the trampoline park.

“What’s up Dodge?” Ashlyn met his gaze.

“What’s the matter with Wee?”

“She’s upset because she’s being punished.”

“Oh. Um...can I go bounce?” he asked quietly, knowing that his sisters wouldn’t be joining him.

Ali checked the time. The trampoline park minimum time was 30 minutes so he could definitely do that, but there wasn’t time for a full hour because after Drew’s game was over at 11am they were going to drive to the next town over and eat lunch together with Ken and Vicki. They had to be back for Dodge’s soccer game at 1pm but that was plenty of time to get lunch. The brunette nodded at her wife and then turned and led a still-whimpering and sniffling Lily around the corner to join the rest of the family.

“Yeah buddy, let’s go” Ashlyn smiled at the boy and reached for his hand. “Do you have socks on?” she looked down at his feet where she was relieved to see socks and sneakers. 

“Ah-huh” he nodded and returned her smile. “But my cleats are in my bag...”

“No, that’s good. Remember, you have to wear socks to go into the trampoline park” she reminded the boy for the fifth time that morning.

“Oh yeah, I forgot” he grinned up at her and hopped up and down in his excitement.

“Tough morning?” Ken quietly asked his daughter as they sat next to each other watching Drew’s soccer game.

“Ugh” Ali rolled her eyes. “The no jumping is a punishment from Friday night!” she explained in an animated whisper so the girls couldn’t hear her. “And I can’t believe she just asked you to take her over there!” the brunette’s eyes were huge with disbelief. “She can be such a little sneak” Ali huffed and then they both cheered loudly when Drew’s team scored another goal.

Ashlyn yelled just as loudly from the upper level platform that ran above the two main hallways of the complex. It was a great design that allowed parents, just like Ashlyn, to keep an eye on bouncing children at the trampoline park and then walk ten feet away and check in on the soccer game their other child was playing in. 

“For what it’s worth, she looks like she gets it now” he chuckled as they both took in the sight of the pathetic girl as she sat on the other side of Vicki who was sitting between both girls. 

Lily had her flamingo held tightly to her chest with both arms wrapped around it and a huge, angry frown on her face. She kicked her legs out and back under the bench they were all sharing but that was the only part of her body that moved.

“God, let’s hope so.”

The rest of the day went better than the morning had. Drew’s team won their game and the dark-haired boy was excited about scoring the first goal. Lunch had been fun and yummy with Ken and Vicki and they had even squeezed in a quick trip to Target to kill some time before Dodge’s game started up at 1pm. They said goodbye to Grandpa and Vivi after Dodge’s team lost their game. The only big development that happened there was that Dodge played goalkeeper for the second half of the game. None of the kids liked playing goalkeeper because they were all afraid of getting hit by the ball. Ashlyn had never pushed any of them to do it, knowing that you couldn’t have a keeper, at any age, who was afraid of the ball. They went home to change out of soccer clothes, play with the dogs, and relax for an hour before heading down to Lynnfield to hang out with the four families for an early dinner at the Dwyer’s house. They made one stop along the way, keeping Ali’s promise to Lily from Friday morning. The brunette held her daughter’s hand as they walked up to the food pantry a few towns away from Gloucester. Ali beamed as she watched Lily shuffle towards the old woman at the desk inside, the weight of the 10 cans she was dragging between her legs in a plastic bag making the short walk very difficult. When Ali had done some research about local food donation locations, this food pantry came up and had more recommendations and testimonials than any other.

“Ready to go?” Ali prompted the little girl when Lily lingered by the door, looking back into the big, mostly empty space that smelled kind of funny.

“Where are all the people?”

“Oh, they only come in at certain times” the brunette explained, her hand on the girl’s shoulder. “See all those tables and chairs in there?”

“Ah-huh.”

“Those all get filled up with people who need some help from time to time.”

“And they’ll eat our food too?”

“Mmmm Hmmmm” Ali nodded as they both watched two people at the far end of the big room start to turn lights on and put big aluminum pans of food into the warming trays on the food line. “They’ll probably be doing Sunday dinner pretty soon.”

“What are those people doing?”

“They’re volunteers who serve the food to the people who’ll come in to eat.”

“Oh.”

Ali could see the gears turning in her daughter’s head and had a sneaking suspicion that they would be back to volunteer at the food pantry sooner rather than later. 

By the time they got back to the big old house that evening, there was just enough time for showers and a movie before bed. The girls had recovered nicely from their earlier punishment. Both Ashlyn and Ali urged their kids to learn from their mistakes and move on, not dwelling on whatever misery had befallen them. That applied to normal, everyday hardships and obstacles as well as punishments. They both hated punishing their kids, but had to admit that some of the nicest and best hugs came immediately afterwards. The whole family felt better and lighter after any punishment period ended. Sunday had been no different. Josie and Lily played well with the Cross, Dwyer and Flanagan kids that afternoon and early evening and it didn’t take long for all the Kriegers to forget about the punishments altogether. 

Ali and Ashlyn let the kids stay up a little later than usual so they could finish the movie, with the understanding that there would be no storytime that night. Drew and Josie made it through to the end, which was only 15 minutes past bedtime, but Lily was struggling to keep her heavy eyelids open and Dodge had fallen asleep thirty minutes earlier. He was tucked into Ashlyn’s side, using her chest as a pillow, and breathing heavily through his open mouth. The whole family was sprawled out on the big ‘L’ bend couch in the front living room, including both dogs, and they laughed together as they enjoyed the movie. Ashlyn carried Dodge up the front stairs when it was time for bed, smiling when she felt him sleepily pat her back after she repositioned him against her chest for the climb. He had always done that. As soon as he had gained control of his arms as a baby, Dodge had lovingly patted whomever had been kind enough to pick him up and hold him. It was arguably the sweetest thing he did and both his moms were pretty sure he didn’t even realize he was doing it. Ali walked ahead of her wife, ushering the other kids up the stairs and into their bedrooms, shushing them and urging them to use the bathroom one more time before getting into bed.

“But I don’t have to pee” Josie whined, her tiredness finally showing itself.

“Just try little one, please” the brunette guided her into the girls’ bathroom and then crossed the hall into Dodge’s bedroom where she pulled the covers down on his bed so Ashlyn could put him right into it. “Goodnight baby boy” she whispered into his back as she kissed it. She stepped back and watched her wife settle him into place and pull the covers up. “You good?” she asked, pausing at the open door to the hallway.

“Yep” Ashlyn nodded as she tucked the boy in, kissed him on his head and then turned his sound machine and nightlight on. “Be right there.”

Ali found Lily sitting on the floor, playing with her stuffed animals.

“Come on sweetie, let’s go pee” she reached out her hand to the little blonde girl. Lily gave her a cranky look and huffed out a sigh. “Now Lily, let’s go” Ali pushed on, not wanting her daughter to get a head of steam towards a meltdown. Her voice was calm and quiet but still urgent. There was no mistaking what was expected of the girl. “The faster you go, the sooner you can come back and get all your guys into bed with you for the night.”

Lily’s “guys” were her stuffed animals and she made a show every night of picking five or six of them to sleep with. Both moms knew it was a stalling tactic but it was cute and they tried to indulge her, within reason.

When all four kids had been tucked into bed and kissed goodnight by both of their moms, Ali and Ashlyn went back downstairs to clean up the house and make sure everything was ready for a busy Monday morning. They both moved with extra purpose and tried to complete their tasks as quickly as possible. The promise of sex from the night before was at the forefront of each of their minds as they moved through the first floor of the big house. After all the backpacks had been checked and packed, lunches made, the dishes and cups from the day put in the dishwasher, the load of laundry moved from the washer into the drier, and the dogs loved up and let out and then back in for the night, both Ashlyn and Ali made their way upstairs. Ali quietly opened Josie’s bedroom door so Persey could take her spot on the extra twin bed there. The old brindled dog loved to be near her people but she didn’t always want to be on the same bed so sleeping with Josie but on her own bed had been the perfect solution for her. Fred on the other hand didn’t care where he slept. But Lily cared very much. Ali moved down the hall to her youngest daughter’s room and let the big old caramel colored dog inside. She watched for a minute as he walked over to the foot of Lily’s bed and climbed up, using the tiny princess chair with a pillow on the seat as a step stool to reach his destination. He had arthritis in his back and it had slowed him down but not stopped him. He appreciated steps like Lily had crafted for him so he didn’t have to jump all the time.

“I just need a minute” Ashlyn called out from the bathroom when Ali knocked softly on the door a few minutes later.

The brunette could hear the water running in the tub and wondered what her wife had planned. They were both tired and Ali had assumed they would just get right to it so they could go to sleep. A bath might be nice though.

“Ow! Fuck!” 

“You ok in there?” Ali asked sweetly. “Can I come in?”

“Yeah, sure” came the resigned reply.

When the brunette pushed the door to the master bathroom open she smiled lovingly at the sight awaiting her. Ashlyn was perched on the edge of the big two-person soaking tub, just inside the door, shaving her legs at a breakneck pace. She had taken her joggers off but was otherwise fully dressed and concentrating hard. There was blood running down her right leg from the cut she had just given herself on the side of her knee and Ali frowned when she saw it.

“Honey, what are you doing?” she asked softly as she moved behind her keeper’s hunched back and started caressing it slowly.

“Carving up my knee, what does it look like?” Ashlyn chuckled. “I’m sorry baby, I’ll be right there. I just wanted to shave real quick.”

“I see that” Ali giggled as she reached for a Kleenex and pressed it to the tiny cut on her wife’s knee. She dabbed it carefully while Ashlyn worked quickly on the other leg. “Just slow down. I don’t want you fainting at the sight of your own blood now” she teased and pressed a kiss into her keeper’s thigh. 

“Ha ha, very funny” Ashlyn rolled her eyes. “Ow, that really stings” she looked over at her right knee where Ali had started to rinse the left-over shaving cream off with water from the tub.

“Just keep going” Ali pointed at her wife’s left leg as she continued to rinse the right leg off. “I’ve got this one now.”

“I’m sorry. I thought I could just take care of this and be ready and...”

“Shhh...” Ali shushed her and squeezed her thigh. “You know you don’t have to do this babe” she shook her head and smiled at her wife. “Where’s my wife who’s always telling me I don’t have to shave...”

“I know, but I wanted to” she shrugged, feeling silly all of a sudden. “I hadn’t shaved the other night either and I...I don’t know” she shrugged again, trying to focus on the last few strokes of the razor on her left leg.

Ali felt her heart swell as she listened to the woman of her dreams be shy and adorable about having some hair on her legs. The fact that Ashlyn still cared enough to try and do those little things for her when they were always so short on time was probably the sexiest thing the blonde could have done for her that night. Ali felt her core twitch at the thought and moved closer to her wife, wrapping her left arm around her waist from behind as she stood next to the tub. 

“We could have just had a nice bath and I could have done this for you” she purred into Ashlyn’s ear as she moved closer still. “Less blood that way too” she couldn’t resist another dig, knowing Ashlyn would have teased the shit out of her too if their roles had been reversed.

“Can’t argue with you there” the keeper chuckled and sat up after finishing her left leg. She closed her eyes and enjoyed Ali’s hot breath near her ear and neck. 

Ali let her hands move around her wife’s strong back now that it was sitting up straight again. Then she took a half step back and lifted her sweatshirt and t-shirt over her head in one motion, exposing her small, perky breasts with their dark pink nipples. Ashlyn felt the motion next to her and turned her head to get a look at her favorite half-naked body on the planet. She felt her own desire rising up at the beautiful sight and shifted sideways on the edge of the tub to get a better view. Ali smirked and then bent over to take off her yoga pants, panties and socks, standing up again completely naked.

“Anything else need shaving?” she quirked her eyebrow at the blonde, loving the way Ashlyn’s eyes had started to darken already.

The keeper put the razor on the shelf at the back of the tub and then hurried to take her own clothes off until she was left in just her grey boxer briefs. Ali licked her lips when she saw her wife’s sweet, pink nipples already starting to come to attention for her. Ashlyn stood up, both feet inside the ankle-deep water of the tub, and stepped out of her underwear, turning to face her wife.

“You tell me” she challenged with a sexy smirk, and her hands on her hips.

“Mommy, I’m thirsty” Lily’s small voice carried into the bathroom from the hallway door to their bedroom. “Mommy?”

Both women groaned in frustration. Ashlyn’s shoulders dropped and she let her long arms hang down by her side in defeat. Ali closed her eyes and shook her head for a second before grabbing her robe from the back of the bathroom door and hastily slipping into it.

“I’ll be right back” the brunette took a step forward and kissed her wife quickly on the lips. “Promise” she avowed before hustling into the bedroom and steering Lily back towards the girls’ bathroom for a drink of water.

“I’ll be waiting” Ashlyn replied with a frustrated sigh as she bent over to rinse off her legs and then got out of the tub. Being interrupted by one of the kids was something both she and Ali had joked about in the days before their wedding. It wasn’t very funny when it happened to them now. But that was just the way their life was. Patience was indeed a virtue. She dried herself off and muttered underneath her breath again, “I’ll be waiting.” After a couple of minutes she let a heavy sigh escape her lips and got herself situated on the bed, keeping her robe close by, just in case. It only took a few seconds longer for her aggravation to dissipate as she stretched out, propped up on one elbow as she lay on her left side. She spoke to her wife even though Ali was still getting Lily back to bed and out of earshot. “Good thing you’re always worth the wait.”


	7. Meg

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so my work week was a lot harder than I anticipated. Sorry for the delay. Here's chapter 7 and then the final chapter will go up tomorrow.

Meg Doucette never used to like Mondays very much. But she didn’t mind them during basketball season because she usually had a game Monday evenings at 6pm. Basketball had been the first sport she loved as a little girl and, looking back at it now from halfway through her junior year of high school, it was probably because of the little plastic play hoop and soft, pretty-colored balls her mother had bought her to play with as a baby. There was a 5x7” framed photograph Hannah kept prominently displayed in the living room, no matter where she had lived with her daughter as she had grown up. It showed a grinning, red-haired toddler holding one of those small colored balls in each of her little hands, arms extended up over her head and slightly out to the side. The plastic play hoop stood on its own thick pink plastic legs with a red rim and a pink backboard. It had been designed for girls and back in 2013, when Meg was an adorable, active one-year old, that meant pink backboards and pretty pastel-colored balls for little girls to try and toss through the hoop. 

“Why do you love that dumb picture so much anyway?” the difficult 13-year old girl asked her mother one evening while they were watching tv together in the big fancy house that they lived in at the time with Dev, her mother’s husband. 

Hannah bit back the urge to return the snark her daughter had just delivered in her judgmental, bratty way. Instead she sighed and tried to bring the warm, loving feelings that the photo always engendered in her to the front of her brain, hoping to speed them along.

“Because for the first three years of your life nothing made you happier than that basketball hoop and those balls. Nothing” she smiled as she replied, happy the memories could still be counted on to soothe her and fill her with lovely images of her baby girl. “The yellow one was your favorite” she grinned as she spoke. “You would cry your face off if we couldn’t find the yellow one...”

“It’s so lame that everything was pink” Meg’s harsh voice cut through the happy memory. “And yellow, and, what is that? Lime green? God, how sexist is that?”

“Oh Meg” Hannah sighed, tired of the constant battle with her daughter over everything those days. “It’s the best they could do back then.”

“Well, it sucked.”

“A lot of people thought the pretty colors would help little girls get more involved in sports” Hannah explained patiently, trying not to lose her temper at her daughter’s insolent attitude. “It was a big deal that companies spent money making ‘boy’ toys look appealing to girls. It was different then than it is now.”

“Thank God. That’s embarrassing” the teen shook her head and rolled her eyes so hard and high that Hannah thought they might actually get stuck up there for once.

“Try to focus on the cute kid with the big smile who was a joy to be around and made me laugh and love her more every single day” Hannah replied sarcastically, unable to stay on the high road after an afternoon and evening already full of snark from her difficult daughter. This was the Meg who would soon run away and try and escape to her step-mother’s house in Gloucester.

“God, I can’t even look at a stupid picture without doing it wrong!” Meg yelled and jumped up off the couch, spilling the bowl of popcorn that had been resting between them and knocking it to the floor. “I’m sorry I’m not that cute kid anymore ok? I wish I was too, believe me!” she yelled dramatically and stomped out of the room.

“You come back here and clean this mess up young lady! Right now!!” Hannah yelled back after her.

“No!!”

Hannah could hear her daughter stomp her way up the stairs and then down the second-floor hallway out of earshot. It was quiet for a few seconds and then she heard the picture-rattling slam of Meg’s bedroom door. There would be heartfelt apologies in the morning but it wouldn’t be long before the next outburst came from the teen who was just trying to learn how to handle all the emotions and hormones and feelings that were coursing through her changing body. It had been an intense stretch of months but, after the brazen and terrifying excursion to Boston, things had started to calm down a little bit between mother and daughter. Hannah tried to be even more patient, if that was possible, and Meg tried to believe that her mother didn’t hate her and wasn’t really trying to find fault with every single thing she did.

16-3/4 year old Meg Doucette had matured remarkably over the past year. She was still getting used to the womanly body she had developed, just like her mother’s, but she had found a way to calm those outrageous emotions and fears that seemed to set her nerves on fire when she was 13 and 14 and 15. She still had her moments, no doubt, but it was easy for Hannah and those closest to Meg to see the adult inside her working to keep things on an even keel. It was like a fuzzy, out of focus picture – sometimes you could see the 25-year old woman Meg was going to become staring back at you but then, just a few moments later, the picture would get hazy and then the insecure, hyper-sensitive teenager would come back into focus for a while.

“Margaret Ann Doucette!! I’m not telling you again! You’re gonna be late and I’m not driving you! You can take detention and explain to coach Ricks why you had to miss practice!” Hannah yelled up the stairs, frustrated beyond belief.

Meg stretched, glanced up at the clock next to her bed and then groaned. Fuck. She was going to be hella late. Usually Mondays during basketball season weren’t so bad, but there was no game that night so it was just a regular, awful, Monday morning. They were 10 days between her last game, Friday night, and her next game, a week from tonight on January 22nd, and Meg couldn’t remember what the reason was as she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and sat up. She slowly got her brain to focus on the task at hand and plotted her best course of action to avoid pissing off her mother and get to school on time so she wouldn’t get detention for being late.

“I’m up!” she yelled as loud as she could, her voice carrying through her closed bedroom door, down the hallway of the modest 2-story colonial home, and to the foot of the stairs where her mother stood with a scowl on her upturned face.

It was 8:09am and she had to be at the busstop three blocks away by 8:32am if she wanted to catch it. That gave her 20 minutes to get ready and 3 minutes to run to the busstop. She nodded her head and jumped out of bed, moving swiftly to her dresser and throwing clothes onto the messy bed before running across the hall to use the bathroom. The good news was she had taken a shower last night after her workout so all she had to do was brush her teeth, get dressed, put some make-up on, and try to make her unruly red curls look a little less bed-heady. 

Hannah relaxed for a moment once she heard her daughter’s heavy heels above her. When she was convinced Meg was truly up and getting ready, she went back into the kitchen to make her something to eat that she could carry with her to the bus. She looked at the pile of backpack, gym bag, winter jacket and boots that had been deposited next to the kitchen table the evening before and wondered if Meg had gotten things done last night before bed. She knew her homework was done, thankfully, but she didn’t remember fresh basketball clothes getting put into the gym bag for practice that afternoon. Before she could think much more about it, Meg came running into the kitchen in a whirl of activity. Her arms and legs all seemed to be doing different things at the same time while her body moved past the big kitchen island where Hannah was standing and towards the kitchen table. One arm opened the fridge while the other pulled out a protein bar and rummaged around for her water bottle.

“Have you seen my water...?”

“Here” Hannah reached behind her near the sink, picked up the water bottle and made sure the cap was screwed on tight as she pushed it into her daughter’s long, strong fingers. “I washed it.”

Meg’s legs kept driving her towards her pile of belongings by the kitchen table even as her arm remained behind with the water bottle and her face gave Hannah a grateful grin.

“Thanks mom. Have you seen my hat?”

“Which one?”

“My hat, you know...” Meg answered distractedly as she zipped up her backpack and threw it over her shoulder after shoving her water bottle inside it. “The Wilson one.”

“Sweetie, you’ve got a dozen Wilson hats, which one are you looking for?” Hannah chuckled as she scanned the room for a hat that might fit the bill.

“Ah, got it” Meg pulled a green knit winter hat out of her coat pocket and tugged it onto her head. The white tiger logo on the front representative of the Woodrow Wilson High School Tigers and the school colors of green and white. “No game tonight but we have practice” she turned and threw her gym bag over her head and across her chest with a grunt.

“Here” Hannah walked around the island and met Meg back at the entrance to the kitchen, marveling at the way the girl hadn’t stopped moving once on her loop through the big room. “Eat it on the bus” she put a fried egg sandwich in a plastic sandwich bag into her hand and kissed her cheek. She tucked a couple of napkins into her coat pocket at the same time. “I love you. Have a good day. Text me when you need to be picked up.”

“Thanks mom” Meg grinned, thankful for the breakfast sandwich, her favorite. “Love you too.”

She shoved her feet into her boots, knocked over a pile of shoes that Hannah had been organizing over the weekend, and jogged towards the door, hesitating for just a second when she realized the mess she’d made.

“Just go, I’ve got it” Hannah waved her on. “Be careful on the sidewalk! It froze last night so there’s ice out there” she called out a final warning as the door closed swiftly behind her daughter’s tall form.

Tenleytown was a wealthy neighborhood in the North West area of Washington DC. Dev had moved them into a huge, fancy house back in the Spring of 2020 after he had married Hannah that February. Meg had turned 8 years old that Spring and started 3rd grade a few months later in the Fall. She finished 2nd grade at her old school, down in the Southwest Waterfront neighborhood of DC. The Southwest Waterfront area was a working-class neighborhood on the Southern edge of the DC mainland, with the Anacostia River just to the south of it and the Potomac River to the west. The neighborhood was full of every race you could think of and this was where Hannah’s apartment had been when Ashlyn first met and started dating her. That was the same apartment that Ashlyn had spent so much time with Meg and Hannah as their own little family unit back when the little girl was only 3 years old. That was the only home Meg had ever known before moving with her mother into the big house with Dev. 

They had spent almost 7 years in the extravagant mansion in Tenleytown before Dev moved out just after Christmas 2026. He moved to a luxury condominium in one of the highrise buildings in Stanton Park near the capitol building while Hannah and Meg stayed in the house for three more months before Hannah officially filed for divorce in March of 2027. She had used her nest egg savings to rent a small apartment in Tenleytown so Meg’s school and sports schedules wouldn’t be disrupted. It was the most expensive apartment she had ever lived in and she could barely afford it, which is why Ashlyn and Ali had agreed to pay for all of Meg’s extracurricular expenses that year while the divorce dragged on. It had killed Hannah to accept their help, but she put her pride aside so she could keep Meg in toney Tenleytown with her new friends. 

As soon as the divorce was finalized in February of 2028, and Hannah had become a wealthy woman, she and Meg picked out a house that they both liked and that was more their style and size. It was still in Tenleytown but it was modest in comparison with most of the other homes in the expensive neighborhood. Hannah could have afforded a house even bigger than the one Dev had bought for them to live in but she didn’t want that. For all of her flaws, Hannah could be remarkably down to earth sometimes, especially when it came to raising her daughter. She didn’t want to raise a stuck-up, snobby girl any more than the rest of the mothers of the world did. Tenleytown had a lot of rich, stuck-up snobs and living there had made Hannah’s skin crawl more than once. But she couldn’t argue about the excellent public schools, the safe streets and public spaces, and the impressive community events and youth athletic programs. So Hannah had agreed to stay in Tenleytown, at least until Meg graduated from high school. After that? Who knew? All Hannah was focused on was getting her daughter through high school and into college so she would have far more options available to her for how she could spend the rest of her life. Like all mothers, Hannah only wanted the best for her girl...she wanted Meg to have better opportunities than the ones she had as a young woman trying to make her way in DC.

Meg watched the nice houses roll by outside the bus window as she sat there eating her breakfast sandwich and trying not to spill too many fried egg crumbles all over herself. The girl sitting next to her gave her a judgmental side-eye but Meg didn’t care. She just kept on eating her breakfast. For all she knew, the girl was jealous of the delicious sandwich and not really judging her for anything. And honestly, she could have been judging her for a dozen different things from her wild red curls to her big bulky gym bag to the bruise on her left cheekbone from the elbow she had taken in Friday night’s basketball game. Meg swallowed another bite of sandwich as the bus came to the last stop before they would arrive at school. Four students got on and one of them, Isaac Quarles, was the starting big forward for the boys’ varsity basketball team. He didn’t usually ride the bus but every once in a while he would make an appearance if his car was out of commission or out of gas or being borrowed by one of his relatives. His family wasn’t one of the wealthiest in town. He was one of the most popular kids in school, mostly because he had a killer jump shot and was tall, built and beautiful. He would never be quite as popular as his teammate and other starting forward who was white, but Isaac couldn’t control the racism that was still present in the world. Things had gotten better but there was still lots and lots of work to be done to eliminate the racial prejudices so many Americans struggled with.

“Hey Douce” he nodded on his way to an empty seat when he saw Meg.

“Hi Ike” she replied with a shy smile, her mouth full.

The judgy girl’s mouth dropped open at the interaction and Meg’s morning got exponentially better, just like that. One small win to start the week off. She would take it. Meg shrugged with a tiny smirk on her face and the judgy girl shook her head in disbelief and spent the last ten minutes of the ride texting furiously into her phone. Meg was definitely not one of the popular girls in school. But she was an athlete and a starter on two varsity teams, and the captain of the varsity soccer team as a junior, and that in itself demanded a certain amount of respect, at least among the other athletes at the school. And because most of the popular girls worshipped the male athletes that they all drooled over, Meg’s extraordinary acknowledgment from Ike Quarles was the type of thing that threw the whole system out of whack and made the popular, judgy girls’ faces twitch.

Nobody but her teammates, and apparently the other athletes at school, called her Douce, which was pronounced like ‘deuce’. Everybody that heard the nickname assumed it was because she wore the number 22, which didn’t even make sense. Most kids in the school of 1,700 didn’t even know her last name was Doucette so they couldn’t have known that was the origin of her nickname. Meg wore the coveted #1 jersey as keeper for the varsity soccer team because she was the starter and the best keeper the school had ever seen, boy or girl. But for basketball she had surprised everybody in her family by choosing #22 to be her jersey number. Hannah had never played many sports when she was in school. She had been a cheerleader during football and basketball seasons and then played tennis in the Spring. But that was it. The women that Meg looked to as inspiration for her own successful high school athletic career were Ashlyn, of course, and less obviously, Ali.

“What do you mean she’s wearing #22?” Ali’s eyes had gone wide when Ashlyn had told her the story behind Meg’s basketball jersey number the year before.

“She’s a sophomore now and they want her to float between jv and varsity so she gets to have a say in her number” Ashlyn shrugged, beaming with pride at both her step-daughter’s sweet gesture and her wife’s flabbergasted reaction. “And she chose #22, for you.”

Ali sat down in her desk chair, overwhelmed with emotions she had never expected to come up while talking with her wife about Meg’s upcoming high school basketball season. She sniffled and then laughed and then sniffled again while she tried to get control of herself as they sat in her office at Knight-Harris. Ashlyn moved around the desk and squatted down in front of her wife with her hands going on top of Ali’s thighs after spinning her chair to the side. She looked up into teary chocolate eyes and smiled so widely that her dimple appeared which always cheered the brunette up.

“Wow” Ali held one of Ashlyn’s hands while she tried to keep her mascara in place with the fingertip of her other hand. “I just...I don’t know” she shrugged and laughed again. “I never thought about it before and I’m really really touched that she would do that” she tilted her head sweetly and looked down at her keeper. “Are you sure it’s for me?”

“Honey, of course I’m sure” Ashlyn chuckled and lifted the brunette’s hand to pull it to her lips and kiss it. “She told me herself. And I’m sure she’ll tell you the next time she talks to you. She was pretty excited about it.”

“Really?” Ali’s face wrinkled in confusion again.

“Really” the keeper chuckled softly and rubbed her thumb across the back of Ali’s hand as she held it. “She asked me if I thought it would be ok and I told her I knew you’d love it. Was I wrong?”

“No, no...” she choked back more emotion. “You were right. I love it. A lot.”

“She thinks you wore it because it was your mom’s number...” Ashlyn frowned a little, unsure if Meg had gotten the story right or not.

“She’s right” Ali smiled, amazed that the girl had remembered a conversation they must have had years ago. “Mom wore it when she played basketball in high school and college and that’s why I picked it.” She paused for a few seconds and grinned even wider. “I was always #11 growing up...”

“I remember” Ashlyn laughed out loud. “Something about the stupid rule that only keepers could be #1?” she teased.

“Well it is a stupid rule” Ali shook her head but chuckled. “But I couldn’t get #11 for basketball or volleyball in high school so I chose #22 for my mom. Then, when I got to Penn State for college soccer and #11 was taken, I chose #22 again and it just felt right, you know?” 

“Sure sounds right to me” the keeper’s dimpled grin grew even wider. “And I love that Meggie’s got it now too. Your mom’s gonna flip when she hears” she laughed softly.

“Oh, let’s let Meg tell her. Ok?” excitement flashed in Ali’s watery eyes.

“Deal” Ashlyn nodded. 

They were both quiet for a moment before Ali spoke again.

“But why didn’t she pick #24? Did somebody else already have it?”

She wasn’t fishing for compliments, and Ashlyn knew it. Ali genuinely couldn’t understand why Meg would choose to wear her number instead of Ashlyn’s or her favorite USWNT player’s.

“Baby, she loves you” Ashlyn moved her hands to Ali’s hips, eager to make her point and gave her wife a little shake for emphasis. “I think she feels like you never get any of the credit for anything good she ever does, which is totally true. You’re her third mom, whether you wanted to be or not” she chuckled again. “I know you never wanted to step on Hannah’s toes or my toes, but Meg could always feel it. She always knew you were her mom too, even before she knew what to call it or what to call you” Ashlyn’s face filled with love and emotion and her bottom lip started to quiver. “You’ve always been there for her, no matter what, and that means a lot especially for a girl who had so many changes going on in her life. She’s a great kid and you’re a big reason for that and I feel like she knows it too. It might seem silly, but I think this is her way of acknowledging it. Of recognizing you and all you’ve done for her, her whole life.”

“It’s not silly at all” Ali gasped as a sob finally escaped her lips. “It means the world to me” she choked out. “I never would have thought I’d be so emotional about this, not in a million years” she sniffled again and took a breath. “But it means the world to me.”

Deb had indeed flipped a couple of weeks later at Christmas when Meg had told her in person about wearing #22 for basketball for the rest of her high school career. As important as Ali had been to the little redhead growing up and spending part of her summers in the big old house, Deb and Ken and Vicki had been important too. Deb and Meg had always had a special connection. After all, she was Deb’s first grandchild and would always hold a precious place in the older woman’s heart. Meg had some of the same memories that Ali did of going to get ice cream with Ken on a summer afternoon. Meg was as big a member of the Krieger clan as anybody else was and she had been showered with the same Krieger love all her life. It was a small symbolic gesture to wear #22, but it reverberated loudly throughout the family.

“See ya Ike” Meg said as she got off the bus when it arrived at school.

“Later Douce” he nodded back.

“Was that Ike Quarles?” Tiff asked in a shocked whisper, bumping her shoulder into her best friend as they giggled and walked towards the school building. Tiff didn’t ride the same bus but they always waited for each other and walked in together to start the day.

“Yep. I had no idea he even knew who I was” Meg whispered back.

“I had no idea he rode the bus!” Tiff laughed out loud and bumped Meg’s shoulder again as they continued their walk.

It was cold and they could see their breath freeze in front of their faces in the below-freezing 28 degree morning. Washington DC was a hell of a lot warmer than Boston was, but nowhere near as warm as Satellite Beach. The cold season certainly wasn’t as cold or as long as the cold season up North, but it still got pretty fucking cold in DC. People were always surprised by that. Technically, it was part of ‘the South’ in many people’s eyes but it was still a mid-atlantic locale with the appropriate climate. The two girls huddled together against the cold as they kept moving among hundreds of other students towards the big red brick building where they would spend their day. Classes started at 8:55am and went until 3:25pm, five days a week. There were three different schedules: a Monday schedule; a Tuesday/Thursday or ‘odd’ schedule; and a Wednesday/Friday or ‘even’ schedule. Monday’s schedule was unique because they went to all 8 classes that they were taking, but for a short period of time. On Tuesday, the odd schedule, Meg went to periods 1 and 3 for 90 minutes each in the morning. Then she went to lunch. Then she went to periods 5 and 7 in the afternoon. On Wednesday, the even schedule, Meg went to periods 2 and 4 for 90 minutes each morning, then had lunch, then went to periods 6 and 8 in the afternoon. Meg had several classes with Tiff and their other friends, none of whom were athletes. She also had a bunch of classes with her soccer and basketball teammates, like Amber – her bestie from the soccer team. 

“Hey Douce” one of her soccer teammates waved from a bench where they were sitting, pretending the cold weather wasn’t bothering them.

“Hi guys!” she waved back, grinning at them. 

She played basketball with half of her soccer teammates, the other half opting for volleyball which was another winter sport at their school. Tiff had come to grips with the fact that her best friend had a whole other group of friends that she had absolutely nothing in common with. She didn’t like it but she loved Meg and wasn’t willing to give up their friendship so they made it work. Meg’s soccer friends had also accepted the fact that she had other non-athlete friends who were sometimes around too. Meg, to her credit, never excluded anybody even though there were many times when schedules didn’t work out and plans had to be changed or scrapped altogether. Her theory was that she spent a lot of time with her soccer and basketball friends while they were practicing and playing and travelling to and from their games, so that meant during regular school time she tried to hang out with Tiff and her other regular friends more. It was a good plan that usually worked pretty well.

“Meg! Hey, wait up!” 

The tall redhead turned around to see Amber jogging towards her, waving goodbye to the rest of their teammates over her shoulder.

“Hey Amber, how you doing?” she hugged her soccer bestie. Amber played volleyball instead of basketball which helped maintain the equilibrium between she and Tiff in the never-ending power struggle over sweet, friendly Meg.

“Good, tired” she sighed as she fell into step with the two other girls. “I was up all night cramming for that history test today. I barely know what my name is right now” she laughed and rolled her eyes.

“Oh shit” Tiff’s face went pale, which was hard to see because they were all cold from being outside. “I’m completely fucked...”

“You didn’t forget did you?” Meg turned to her best friend with a look of horror on her face. “What are you gonna do?”

“Ummm...” Tiff’s breathing picked up as her heart raced while she tried to come up with some sort of plan to get out of taking the history test all three girls had later that afternoon. “I don’t know. Maybe...maybe...fake an illness?”

“Oooh, you could pretend to get your period and have really bad cramps” Amber offered helpfully.

“Yeah, that’s a good one” Meg agreed with a nod. “My stepmom gets really bad cramps sometimes and she has to lie down and you can’t talk to her or move the bed or anything. It’s like she’s dying or something” Meg’s eyes went wide as she tried to explain.

“Can you die from cramps?” Amber’s own face registered shock and fear at the thought. “Really?”

“I don’t think so” Meg shrugged. “But she gets really sweaty and she looks really white and...do you know how somebody looks after they just puked?”

“Yeah, like clammy?”

“Yeah, like that” Meg nodded again. “That’s how she looks the whole time it’s happening. And she can’t talk and she can barely breathe...”

“Holy shit, that sounds awful” Amber shook her head. “I bet you can die from cramps.”

“Well, I don’t know about that, but I’m gonna try and make it look like I’m dying” Tiff finally joined the conversation, having made up her mind. “Here, help me make it look good.”

She moved between the two bigger, stronger girls and gave her backpack to Meg, who now looked like a pack-mule with all the bags strapped to her body. Then Tiff put her arm over each girl’s shoulder and made them put their arms around her waist to help her walk directly to the nurse’s office. She asked Meg to describe her stepmother’s symptoms again and did her best to simulate them, even moaning as they finally made it to their destination.

“Good luck” Meg whispered as she bent over and placed Tiff’s backpack next to the chair she was hunched over in. “Let me know how it goes.”

Meg wasn’t a great student but she worked hard and got mostly B’s in her classes. She paid attention in class because if she didn’t, she wouldn’t understand what she was supposed to be doing for the homework assignment. It just made more sense for her to pay attention. It was a more efficient use of her time. And time was something she didn’t have a lot of during soccer or basketball season. After class got out at 3:25pm she would catch a ride with one of her teammates to the convenience store a few blocks away and buy some soda or candy or gum and blast the radio on the ride back to the school for practice, which started promptly at 4:00pm. Practice went until 5:30pm and then she would either get a ride home from a teammate or Hannah would come and pick her up. If Hannah picked her up they would often go out for a quick dinner before going back home. Hannah didn’t like to cook very much and preferred ordering in and going out. She paid for a food delivery service that dropped off pre-prepared meals so all she had to do was heat them up and that worked out very well for both she and Meg. With Meg’s schedule, it wasn’t always easy to sit down and enjoy dinner together, even though Hannah tried as often as possible. 

If it was a game night, as Mondays usually were, then most of the team would try and get at least some of their homework done after school and before they had to report to the gym at 5pm for the 6pm tip-off. Meg did her best to be diligent and work on her homework for an hour on those days, but it was hard. She was almost 17 and she enjoyed hanging out with her teammates and friends and they had a lot of fun goofing around together and talking about cute boys, and girls, between school and game time. Hannah went to every one of her daughter’s games, whether it was a home game or an away game. More often than not she brought a friend or two along with her, but sometimes she came by herself and cheered her girl on. 

Meg and Hannah had grown much closer after the Dev disaster, as they liked to call it. Meg had been forced to see her mother as a real, living woman with feelings and problems and regrets and hopes and dreams. It had caused the 14-year old to grow up fast in some ways and it had allowed her to see her mother with compassion most teenagers only found for their parents once they reached their 30s and started having their own children. Hannah also had to rely on her daughter for some things that she hadn’t wanted to or needed to before. She had always been the grown-up in their relationship and the strong one and the one who was indestructible and all-powerful. By allowing Meg to see her at her lowest, most fragile, most vulnerable, Hannah had given away some of that power and authority and she had to trust her daughter not to take advantage of the power shift. All in all, aside from Hannah’s broken heart, the Dev disaster had been good for both mother and daughter. In addition to the vulnerability she had shown Meg, Hannah had also been able to demonstrate exactly how resilient and strong and independent women could be. Both were invaluable lessons to share with a 14-15 year old girl.

“Come on Meg, live a little” her teammate Nichelle urged her after basketball practice that Monday afternoon. “We don’t have any games this week, it’s like a mini-vacation, come on!”

“I know but I need to get caught up on my reading. I’m so far behind and this is the only week I’ll have...”

“You’re so lame” Nichelle laughed, but she wasn’t mean about it. It was almost like she was simply stating a fact.

“Yeah, I know” Meg shrugged sheepishly. “But if I can keep my grades up my mom’s gonna get me a car for my birthday. That’s all the motivation I need right there” she explained sincerely. 

“Girl, you can’t even drive with anybody else in your car yet” Nichelle challenged with another laugh.

The driver’s license rules were very similar in both Washington DC and Massachusetts. When you turned 16 you were eligible to get your learner’s permit. You had to take a written test and an eye exam to get the permit. Then, once you had it, you had to log 40 hours of supervised driving time with a licensed driver who was 21 years or older. If you took a driver’s education course you only had to log 30 hours of supervised driving time. Once you had done all of that you had to wait 6 months, although it usually took at least that long to get all of the driving hours and driver’s ed classes finished, and take a road test. If you passed the road test then you were given your Junior Driver’s License. It was a vertical shaped license so everybody could easily see that it wasn’t a real, official, unrestricted driver’s license. There were restrictions on both the learner’s permit and the Junior license: you couldn’t drive between the hours of 12am – 5am without a parent; no cellphones were allowed; and for the first 6 months with your junior license you were not allowed to have anybody in the car who was 18 years or younger, unless they were immediate family members. Then, when you turned 18, your junior license automatically turned into a Full Driver’s License with no restrictions whatsoever. When you turned 21 you had to go get a new picture taken and a new physical license that was sized and shaped like all driver’s licenses in the country.

Meg had gotten her permit 10 months ago when she turned 16 last year. She had gotten her Junior Driver’s License at the end of September last Fall after 6 months with her permit. And soon, in about 2 months, she would be turning 17 and her 6 months restriction on having anyone under the age of 18 in her car with her would be lifted. That was the deadline Hannah had used with the car. If Meg kept her grades up to all B’s, even in Biology which was kicking her ass that year, then Hannah would get her a car for her 17th birthday. Ashlyn had balked at the idea when Hannah broached it with her last summer. Both Hannah and Ashlyn had logged some hours of supervised driving with Meg and her learner’s permit and they had discussed rules about driving and cars in general before presenting them to the teenager from a unified front.

“There’s no way a 17-year old kid needs a brand new car Han, no way” Ashlyn stated plainly over the phone at the end of last summer. “Not even the snooty kids in Tenleytown.”

“Hey, just hold on a minute...” Hannah tried to defend herself.

“No way. Not this time” Ashlyn shook her head even though her ex-girlfriend couldn’t see it. “I always defer to you on everything with her and I’m usually happy to do it. But I don’t want her to have a brand new car. That’s absolutely ridiculous.”

It took some back and forth and some real dialogue to work through the issue but eventually, after a couple of weeks, the two women came to an agreement that they could both live with. If Meg kept her grades up all through her junior year, Hannah would give her a car for her 17th birthday in March. It wasn’t going to be a brand new car though. It was going to be a used car and the teen would either appreciate the enormous, extravagant gift that it was or she would lose it very quickly. And if she let her grades slip between March and June then she would lose the car too. Everything was in Hannah’s name and she could sell it whenever she wanted to. She was paying for the insurance and the registration and she could take it right off the road at a moment’s notice. Ashlyn and Hannah explained all of the details to Meg together via Facetime and the girl had simply squealed with excitement at the possibility of having her own car. It meant freedom! It meant she could drive to and from school. It meant she could drive to the convenience store between school and practice. It meant she could drive herself to all the practices and tournaments she had to get to during the second half of her junior year as well as her senior year. It meant freaking everything.

“I know, but my six months will be up by the time my birthday rolls around and then I will be able to drive your ass around in my own car” Meg smirked at her friend and laughed. “Now will you let me get my reading done?”

“Nope” Nichelle’s laughter rang out again. “You can read the rest of the week. Tonight you come out to the movies with us” she nodded over her shoulder at most of the rest of the team. There were several seniors who would be driving to a restaurant for dinner and then to the movie afterwards. “Make it work with your mom” she pointed at Meg’s phone. “And then get your butt over here” she winked as she walked backwards towards the rest of the team with a big grin on her face.

Nichelle was a junior too, but she was bossy and outgoing and the life of the party most of the time. She was on both the basketball team and the soccer team with Meg, and was a talented starter on both teams. She and Meg had become good friends over the past couple of years and the redhead really liked the beautiful, dark-skinned girl. Every dance move Meg could muster was a direct result of Nichelle’s patient coaching. The dynamic between the two was interesting and it changed from soccer season to basketball season every year. Meg had been named captain of the varsity soccer team as a junior that fall and that was a big freaking deal. She took the role seriously and had been a very good captain. Meg was the boss during soccer season, and, even though she was a benevolent leader of her team, the other girls looked up to her and listened to her. Plus, she had learned how to bark out commands from her spot in goal on the pitch from the very best and nobody messed with Meg during soccer season. During basketball season Nichelle was the better player and therefore her voice carried more weight even though she was only a junior. She wasn’t captain, but she was well-respected by even the seniors because of her prowess on the court. 

Hannah jumped when she felt her phone vibrate against her leg as she sat at her desk working out the details of a big event coming up that weekend.

Meg: Can I go to dinner and the movies with the team after practice tonight?

Hannah: Don’t you have homework? I thought you were going to get caught up on your reading this week?

Meg: Yes, and I will. It’s only Monday. I’ll do my homework when I get home tonight.

Hannah: And the reading?

Meg: I have all week for that. I’ll get it done. I promise.

Hannah: What movie?

Meg: I don’t know yet, probably the new 50 Shades of Grey...

Hannah: ...

Meg: I’m kidding mom. The Dirty Computer sequel.

Hannah: Who’s driving?

Meg: Lauren or Chrissy or Zoe

Hannah: Do you need money?

Meg: Nope. Still have what you gave me yesterday.

Hannah: Be careful. Make sure whoever’s driving is paying attention

Meg: I will mom.

Hannah: Come home right after the movie. I don’t want you out late. Call me and I’ll come get you.

Meg: ...

Hannah: Do you understand me Meg?

Meg: ...

Hannah: Meg you need to reply back...

Meg: Sorry! Had to tell the girls. Zoe will bring me home after the movie. All set.

Hannah: Have fun honey. Make smart decisions. I love you.

Meg: me too you 

“So what’s the deal with that kid you like...what’s his name? Michael?” Zoe asked as she drove through the quiet streets just before 10pm that night.

“Ummm, Marcus?” Meg answered the question with her own question as she sat by herself in the backseat of the car.

“What are you asking me for?” Zoe laughed. “She’s asking me the name of the kid she likes” she laughed again and shared a playful look with one of the other seniors who was sitting in the passenger seat, Olivia. 

“No, it’s Marcus” Meg clarified and cleared her throat. She wasn’t some little freshman anymore and she hated when she acted so indecisive, especially in front of two seniors. Even though they were teammates, they were still seniors and she was a junior. 

“So how much do you like him? Are you guys dating or what?” Zoe kept going, making eye contact with Meg for a second in the rearview mirror and giving her a smile. “I see him at all the games. That’s pretty dedicated” she chuckled and added...“I wish Ike came to all my games.”

“I saw him this morning.”

“Well I hope you saw your boyfriend this morning” Zoe laughed again.

“No, Ike” Meg clarified and sighed in frustration at how confusing this whole conversation had been. “And he’s not my boyfriend.”

“Right, he’s my boyfriend” Zoe quirked an eyebrow in the rearview mirror. “Did somebody slip you alcohol at the restaurant or did you get high at the movies or something?”

“What? No. What are you talking about?” Meg’s face scrunched up in confusion and indignation as she stared back defiantly.

“You dummies” Olivia cackled loudly. “Meg meant Marcus isn’t her boyfriend, not Ike.”

“Oh. Shit. My bad” Zoe said and they all laughed for a minute.

“I don’t really have time for a boyfriend” Meg admitted. “How do you guys do it? You’re both just as busy as I am...”

“Busier! We’re both trying to get into college too!” both seniors laughed again.

“Listen, if you date another athlete they’re just as busy as you are so you don’t have to worry about it so much. He’s there when you both have time but he’s not always up in your business” Zoe explained. “Does Marcus play ball?”

“No, he’s more of a musician” Meg shrugged shyly, her lips turning up into a small smile.

“Oh well, I don’t know what to tell you then” Zoe shook her head as they pulled up to Meg’s house and she turned around to face the redhead in the backseat. “But if you like him you should tell him and see what happens.”

“He was my first kiss” Meg blushed at her admission. “We were 12, and we were in 7th grade” she giggled and couldn’t believe she was having this conversation. 

“So you’ve got history together then” Olivia chimed in again. “That always helps. What happened after the kiss? What’ve you guys been doing for the past four years?”

“Well, umm, we’re just friends. We hang out...”

“I’m telling you Douce, he likes you” Zoe grinned. “No way he comes to all those games unless he’s into you, and I don’t mean just as friends.”

“Make sure you guys go to prom together, that’s a special night” Olivia raised her eyebrows knowingly. “Magic happens on prom night” she winked.

“Oh God, prom?” Meg felt her mouth go dry at the thought. “When do people start asking people to go to that? Like, what’s the protocol?”

“There is no protocol” both seniors laughed. “If you like somebody and wanna go to prom with them, ask them! That’s all the protocol there is.”

“Don’t be that fool who waits too long and then can’t go with the guy you really like” Zoe quirked her eyebrow.

“And don’t be that asshole who waits so long they can’t get anybody to go with at all” Olivia laughed.

“Right” Meg nodded slowly. “Don’t be that asshole. Got it” she looked up at the two faces grinning back at her from the front seat. “Thanks guys. I appreciate...all your help.”

“No problem Meg” Zoe reached out and all three girls fist-bumped before the redhead got out of the car. “See you tomorrow.”

Meg took her time walking up to her house, her head swimming with a million different thoughts about Marcus and junior prom with several odd questions about the movie they had seen that night thrown into the mix for good measure. She dropped her gym bag on the floor with a thud and then her backpack as she bent over and pulled her boots off of her feet. 

“Meg? Is that you honey?”

“Yeah mom, I’m home” she replied and yawned.

“How was the movie?” Hannah asked when Meg walked into the living room and dropped her tired body onto the couch with a groan. “Did you get enough to eat?”

“It was good. Weird but good. Weirder than the first one for sure” she chuckled. “But Janelle Monae was awesome.”

“Oh yeah? Did the vagina pants make the sequel too?” Hannah asked with a laugh.

“Ugh, God mom. Really?” Meg closed her eyes and shook her head at her mother’s question. “That’s what you wanna know about?”

“Hey, they made quite a statement in the first movie. I think it’s a fair question” Hannah giggled at her daughter’s discomfort. “It’s not like I’m gonna go buy a pair or anything, relax.”

Something about Hannah’s reply struck Meg as funny and she started laughing and kept going until it had turned into uncontrollable belly laughs that took her breath away and made her cheeks hurt. Hannah had joined her halfway through her laughing fit and they both were quiet for a few moments as they caught their breath.

“Do you think you’ll get married again mom?”

“Oh, I have no idea” Hannah replied honestly. “Why, do you want me to?”

“I don’t know” Meg shrugged. “I don’t want you to be alone I guess.”

“Don’t you worry about me baby girl” Hannah reached over and patted her daughter on the leg. “When I’m ready to be in a serious relationship again I’ll get back out there. I promise.”

“You promise?”

“I do. But remember, it’s better to be by yourself than to be with the wrong person just because you don’t want to be alone.”

They were quiet for another moment with the show Hannah had been watching on tv muted.

“Will you go back to women again?” Meg asked shyly, keeping her eyes away from her mother’s, embarrassed by the extremely personal question she had just asked. “Never mind. Forget I asked” she added quickly.

“It’s ok Meg. It’s a good question. I don’t know for sure” she shrugged and waited for her daughter’s deep green eyes to find her own. “Those vagina pants get you thinking about some lady lovin’” she teased, hoping to convince Meg that she was completely fine with the question she asked.

“Mom!” Meg looked at her horrified but then they both started laughing again.

“Seriously, I won’t know until I meet whoever it is. Would it bother you if I started dating a woman?”

“Umm, no. Duh, really mom?” Meg rolled her eyes.

“Ok, well I’m just checking” Hannah nodded her head and smiled. “You can tell me though, if you ever change your mind about that.”

“I’m not going to change my mind. I don’t care who you’re with as long as they treat you well and aren’t secretly awful” she chuckled.

It was quiet again and Meg noticed that the picture frame with her and the pink plastic basketball hoop was next to her mother on the couch. She knew it was her mom’s favorite picture of her as a toddler but she didn’t usually see her actually looking at it or holding it.

“What’re you doing with the picture?” she asked evenly, not wanting to pry if her mother didn’t want to talk about it. “Finally get sick of it and ready to put another one in? Maybe Janelle Monae and her vagina pants?” she teased and they both laughed again.

“Yeah, that’s the plan” Hannah chuckled. “You caught me.”

Meg reached her hand out towards her mother and Hannah picked up the framed picture and handed it to her. The teenager looked at the very familiar picture and smiled. She could probably describe the thing in perfect detail with her eyes closed, she had seen it so many times in her life up to that point. But the part of the picture that nobody really noticed, or at least Meg didn’t think anybody noticed, was Hannah herself barely visible at the far right edge of the picture. She was sitting on the floor a few feet away from Meg with one of the biggest smiles the teen had ever seen on her mother’s face. It was literally an ear to ear beaming grin as she watched her baby daughter play with the multi-colored balls and pink basketball hoop. Meg had seen her mother in the photo before but she had never really looked at her until that night. As was so typical with kids, she just obliquely registered the figure in the photo as her mother and never bothered to even look at it for a few minutes, ever. 

“You look really happy here” Meg waved the picture frame a bit and then studied it some more. She was positive she had never seen Hannah look happier than she was in that photograph.

“I was” Hannah smiled at her and the memory of that day.

“Who took the picture?”

“One of my best friends at the time. She moved away though and we lost touch. You’ve never met her, well not since you were about 2.”

“Was she your girlfriend?” Meg asked after another quiet minute passed.

“She was” Hannah nodded solemnly, surprised by the ancient feelings the conversation was bringing up.

That was what made the look on Hannah’s face in the photo so incredible, Meg realized. She had been in love. Hannah had been in love with her beautiful baby girl and also with whomever had taken the photograph. There was a saying about people never looking as beautiful as they did when someone they loved was behind the camera taking the picture. Meg couldn’t get her brain to work it out so she couldn’t share it with her mother. Not then anyway. Maybe if she could get the words right she’d tell her tomorrow morning.

“And then...was Ashlyn your next girlfriend after her?”

“MmmHmmm” Hannah nodded again and braved a look at her daughter’s curious but calm face.

“Why did she leave” Meg waved the picture frame again “and let me go? Why didn’t she stay with me like Ashlyn did?”

Hannah felt her stomach lurch at the question and she tried to steady herself and think of something to tell her daughter. It was a long, quiet minute before she spoke.

“Oh baby girl, I wish I had a good answer for you” she sighed heavily as she turned and met Meg’s wondering eyes. “I don’t know if you’re old enough to have learned this or not, but most of the time when couples break up they don’t stay in touch with the kids. It’s just too hard and complicated and people’s feelings just end up getting hurt and it makes it worse than just leaving in the first place probably would have. Does that make any sense?”

“I think so” Meg was chewing her lip, deep in thought.

“Ashlyn was different. She didn’t want to let you go. She had to keep you in her life and she did everything she could to make that happen. She loved you so much from the very fist time she ever met you. I swear I saw it happen. I saw you smile at her and that smile and your sweet little self just flew right inside her heart and she could never ever get you out of there” Hannah smiled sweetly at her daughter who was listening intently. “Not that she ever wanted to.”

“So the other girlfriend, the first one, she didn’t love me?” Meg’s voice wasn’t upset or hurt, she was just trying to understand how someone her own mother had clearly loved so much would be able to leave them both behind.

“Honey, it’s not really about her doing anything wrong” she explained with a warm smile. “It’s more about Ashlyn being the exception to the rule, as usual” she sighed and smiled as she watched Meg’s face transform as she made sense of her mother’s words.

“Yeah, that makes sense” Meg affirmed a minute later after thinking hard about it. “Ashlyn’s pretty special, isn’t she?”

“When it comes to loving you, she certainly is” Hannah smiled again at the thought. “You’re one lucky kid.”

Meg returned her mother’s smile, handing her back the picture frame as she spoke. “I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's hoping the Pride win in Chicago today but I think it'll be a tough one for them. And here's hoping the backline holds up better against Sam Kerr and company than they did against Crystal Dunn and Jess McDonald. Yeesh. Ali made more than a few mistakes and got burned a couple of times in that game, which is unusual, but there's a reason NC is unbeaten. They're really really freaking good. What I love about Ali Krieger though is that she never ever gives up. Even after her miscues she still attacked the rest of the game and went into beast mode in the second half. The longer the game goes on the harder she fights for the win and I love that about her. That's the heart of a champion, of a warrior, of a leader right there. And even though the Pride lost that game I thought it really showed a ton of good things about the team. Nobody on that squad is going to give up on their plans for this season. They're all just going to fight harder. Hopefully that starts this afternoon in Chicago and Orlando can get a decisive win. I feel like they really need that. No more draws or squeakers for wins. They need a boss performance and maybe today's the day for that. Can't wait to watch!!! Love my team!!!!


	8. Ali

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok so this is it for this shorter installment. The final chapter of Part 8.  
> Part 9 will be coming as soon as I can get it written.   
> Oh, and smut warning at the end of this chapter. And I know the smut hasn't been stellar in this small Part 8. I tried to keep it real and, let's face it, when your week goes the way Ali and Ashlyn's weeks usually do, there's not a lot of time for rockstar sexcapades. You have to settle for what you can manage and appreciate it for what it is until you can make time for more. So...sorry, not sorry, I guess. :)

When Ali’s alarm went off at 6am Tuesday morning, January 16th, she felt like crying. She wasn’t in pain or upset about anything, she was just really, supremely comfortable and cozy as she slowly swam up to consciousness from the depths of her good night’s sleep. She was lying on her left side, facing the fireplace, and curled up into a relaxed fetal position. Ali could feel her wife’s body next to hers and knew that Ashlyn must have been lying on her back because her strong left shoulder was pressed up against her back. No matter how long they’d been sharing the same bed and no matter what else was going on between them or in their busy lives, their bodies always managed to find each other in the night. Ali’s body had backed up towards the middle of the bed and Ashlyn’s had crept over to meet it. Even if they weren’t literally holding onto each other, they were still touching and in contact. The brunette could feel Ashlyn’s long arm stretching all the way down her back, her wrist and pinky finger resting lazily against the curve of Ali’s backside. It was still really cold outside and the big old house was chilly at that hour as well. Ali would have given almost anything to be able to stay curled up in that warm bed with her keeper.

Instead, she sighed and reached over to silence her alarm, stretching and straightening her legs out as she pulled her arm back into the warmth of the covers. Ashlyn shifted position just slightly, still asleep but disturbed by the alarm and the movement of the brunette. Ali blinked her eyes and tried to will herself to get out of bed. ‘The shower will feel so nice and warm’ she tried to persuade herself. ‘The sooner I get up and out of this bed, the sooner it will be tonight and I can get back into it again’ she thought, darkly. It sucked getting out of bed when you were still tired but it was especially brutal on those cold winter mornings. Sometimes a person’s mind could go to dark places, even if only for a minute. She felt her eyelids getting heavy again and then Ashlyn stirred, rolling over on to her left side and scooting closer, trying to spoon her beautiful brunette as she fell back to sleep. Ali quickly moved out of the bed, knowing full well that if she allowed herself to be spooned the struggle would be a thousand times more difficult. She couldn’t help but smile as she watched the keeper snuggle into her new position and hum softly in satisfaction. Ashlyn’s face was the perfect visual representation of comfort and coziness and Ali loved it and resented it at the same time. She thought back quickly to when they had first gotten together back in February of 2016, once they had cleared the air, confessed their true feelings for each other and started having sex in the honeymoon stage of their long-awaited relationship. It had been nearly impossible for either of them to get up and out of whatever bed they had shared the night before. They finally had to agree to get up at the same time or they never would have been able to do it. They had both been crazy weak when it came to resisting the other. Thirteen years later not much had changed in that regard. But they had companies to run, money to earn, mouths to feed and bills to pay now and they simply had no choice but to get up and out of bed every morning. Ali took one last look at her beautiful sleeping wife, smiled softly, and then padded quietly into the master bathroom to get into the shower.

“Ok guys, everybody ready?” Ali asked breathlessly as she trotted into the front living room where all four kids, both dogs and Ashlyn were assembled and waiting for her.

“Come on hon” Ashlyn urged with another glance at the clock. “Let’s do this so you guys can get going.”

“I’m ready, let’s go” the brunette nodded as she took her place standing next to her wife and behind the four young children who were all dressed and ready to go to school. “Do you want to set it up...?” she started to ask.

“No, I’ve got it, just like this” Ashlyn replied as she initiated the Facetime call and held the iPad out in front of the whole group at arm’s length. Sometimes they would set up the iPad on the shelf so nobody had to hold it but Ashlyn didn’t want to take the time adjusting it so they all fit into the screen. “Knock it off guys” she admonished the kids, not knowing or caring who had started what. “Just stand here and be good for 2 minutes while we do this. Got it?” she quirked her eyebrow at all of them.

“Why aren’t they answering?” Lily asked impatiently, looking from one mom to the other.

“Just give them a minute sweetie” Ali suggested and cupped the back of her daughter’s blonde head. “It’s early enough, they don’t usually leave for school until 8:20am” she explained optimistically. It was only 8:10 am and Kyle was never usually early with the kids so she knew they were still at home. “See?” her voice sounded excited as the Facetime call was finally answered by an adorable-looking Edgar Guerrero.

“Hello?” he said as he moved the large phone in his hand around so they could all actually see each other.

“Happy Birthday Edgar!!!” the whole Gloucester Krieger clan shouted and clapped and waved to the birthday boy.

Ali could hear her brother’s laughter from off-screen and then a couple of barks from Peaches as well. Edgar’s face lit up when he recognized his aunts and cousins and then his whole face turned into one beaming grin when he realized why they were calling so early in the day.

“So how does it feel to be 7 years old today?” Ashlyn teased, winking at Drew who turned around to look at her like she was crazy.

“I’m 9 Auntie Ash” he corrected loudly and then laughed when he saw that she was laughing at him already. “Not 7” he laughed again and shook his head.

“We know you have to get to school, and so do we, but we just wanted to send you our love on your big day” Ali moved things along. “Happy birthday Edgar.”

All the kids echoed their mommy’s wishes and waved at their cousin through the screen. Dodge broke ranks first and jumped forward, filling the screen with his grinning, hambone mug.

“Thanks for calling guys” Nathan’s head popped into the screen, right next to his son’s. “Love you all!”

After another minute of noisy greetings and farewells and birthday wishes, Ashlyn ended the call and they all got back to the business at hand. Getting to school on time. In another few minutes Ali was backing the minivan out of the driveway and heading towards school, only 2 minutes behind schedule. Seeing the look of joy and surprise on Edgar’s face had been well worth it. 

By 9:45am Ali was walking through the back door of Knight-Harris Company, still talking to Marcy on her bluetooth, continuing the 20-minute call from the minivan. Commuting from Gloucester to Cambridge every day wasn’t fun. There were definitely worse commutes, and Ali knew it, but sitting in traffic for 60-75 minutes every morning was a pain in the ass. Sometimes Ali made it in an hour and arrived at 9:30am but usually she needed those extra 15 minutes to navigate through the busy city traffic of Cambridge. The first 40 minutes of the drive usually weren’t too bad. But when she got to the Lynnfield and Stoneham area things started to slow down and sometimes came to a complete halt. She had long ago come up with a plan to keep her working even as she sat in the heavy traffic. She returned phone calls to as many clients as she needed to, as long as they weren’t west coast clients who were still asleep. Many days, that was all she had time to do and then she still had a few clients left to call after getting to her desk. She didn’t love calling from the minivan while she was driving because she couldn’t take notes. She had gotten into the habit of recording her calls on a small, digital dictation recorder that she left in one of the empty cupholders between the driver and passenger seats in the front of the minivan. That way she could always play back whatever her half of the conversation had been so she could make notes when she got to her desk. She usually remembered most of the things she discussed with her clients and colleagues during those ‘traffic calls’ as Marcy had dubbed them. But she made sure to repeat back anything important during the call for the recorder’s sake and it had proved to be an effective tool to keep her focused on the road but still able to have productive and meaningful phone call time during her commute.

If she finished her client calls before she made it to the office, Ali would push the button to call Marcy Hopkins, the best hire the brunette had ever made. Marcy was still Ali’s assistant but she was so much more than that. Her official title was Executive Manager and it was an apt description of what she did. She helped the executives manage the rest of the business and then, when Ali or Jared or Whitney wasn’t available, she managed in their places. She had become everything Ali had hoped for when she began grooming her to take on more responsibilities at the company years before. The MBA she completed two years earlier was just the latest feather in Marcy’s cap. Marcy Hopkins was great at her job and Ali loved working with her. She was smart and hard-working and detail-oriented, but she was also creative and quick-thinking and adaptable to almost any situation. Ali trusted her implicitly and couldn’t imagine working at K-H without her trusty confidante and sidekick. K-H would not have been able to grow the way it had over the past several years without Marcy and all of the shareholders knew it. Ali kept her well-compensated and as happy in her position as she could possibly be. And Marcy had rewarded the team with dedicated, hard work that had won over many clients over the years. 

“She said what?!” 

“Ash, babe, calm down and I’ll tell you” Ali spoke into her phone as she closed the door to her office and returned to her desk chair. 

“I can’t fucking believe they won’t do anything about it” the keeper fumed. “I’ll tell you what...” she paused dramatically, “if they won’t fix it, I sure as hell will.”

“Honey, come on. Let’s just try and keep our heads here” Ali pleaded with a sigh.

“How are you so calm about this?” Ashlyn asked her wife, outrage still coloring each of her words. “We’ve totally switched roles here and I don’t get it...”

“Well, the difference is that I had time to process it during the drive in” Ali chuckled ruefully. “I’m still pissed off, but I’m on the other side of it I guess.”

“What exactly did Mrs. Wilson say this morning?”

Almost as soon as Ali had pulled away from the school, her phone had rung and she had talked with Josie’s 2nd grade teacher for the better part of 20 minutes. After Josie’s bullying incident last Tuesday Ali had exchanged several emails with the teacher and two very perfunctory phone calls. The truth was, Mrs. Wilson didn’t have any answers for the Kriegers yet, but she was working on it. This morning they talked about Josie and her bully and, to her credit, Mrs. Wilson hung in there with Ali for the whole time, answering as best she could the questions from the pissed off mother.

“She said that she was aware that Franny Higgins had been bullying Josie and that she was doing her best to put a stop to it.”

“But what does that even mean?”

“She couldn’t give me a lot of details, but she wanted us to know that Franny had some challenges at home and that she was convinced that was the cause of her...issues” Ali took a breath as she leaned back in her leather chair. “Mrs. Wilson is working with Franny on her behavior in class – which means Josie’s not her only victim, and she’s working with her on her more complicated stuff from home.”

“So because she’s got a screwed up home life she’s allowed to bully our kid? I don’t fucking think so” Ashlyn huffed.

Ali couldn’t help but think back to the stories she had heard about Ashlyn’s own challenging childhood. She couldn’t disagree with her keeper on this one. Ashlyn had survived a rough upbringing but she had never resorted to bullying another person as a result. The whole thing made Ali prouder than usual of her sweet, strong, resilient wife. Sure Ashlyn had more reasons to act out than almost anybody back then and she could have been mean to other kids to ease her own pain. But she didn’t. She had never made another person suffer just to make herself feel better. 

“You’re right, you’re absolutely right” Ali replied evenly, trying hard to keep her emotions in check and find a way to settle her wife’s at the same time. “I feel the same way you do. I almost turned the van around and went back to pull Josie right out of class this morning” she admitted with an embarrassed chuckle. “But that would have only made things worse.”

“So what are we supposed to do? Just wait and hope for the best while Josie gets bullied every damned day?!” the keeper’s anger spiked. “She loves going to school so much and if that little shit ruins that for her I swear to God...” she trailed off, too angry and upset to finish the threat.

“Mrs. Wilson gave me her word that she was going to watch Franny like a hawk. She’s already told both of the aides and the other kindergarten teacher to pay extra attention too” Ali explained. “Nobody wants anything else to happen and until they can figure out what’s causing Franny’s behavior they’re just going to try and limit the opportunity she has instead.”

“Those kids, those mean girls, they always find a way to get their digs in Al and you know it. Next time Franny won’t be so bold and do it during recess but you know she’s gonna keep it up in a hundred small ways that the teachers and aides can’t see or hear.”

“I know it’s not good enough Ash” Ali replied, her voice raising in frustration at both the situation and her unrelenting wife. “But it’s the best we’ve got right now unless you want to start going to class with Josie and shadowing her all day every day. And before you say yes to that you know damned well that it’s not gonna work. That would only make it worse. Josie doesn’t need any more attention put on her right now. And this whole thing fucking sucks but I don’t know what else we can do!” she finished in a fury, voice shaking in rage.

“That’s more like it” Ashlyn’s voice sounded a bit more relaxed after hearing a more familiar refrain from her feisty wife. “Glad to have you back, mama bear.”

They were both quiet for a long minute, listening to each other breathe and try to calm down. Ashlyn heard her wife take a deep breath and let it out with a long sigh. It seemed to soothe them both.

“I like the lioness better I think” the brunette commented, referencing the other protective, wild animal that her keeper often compared her to, trying to lighten the mood. “Mama bears are great but the lioness is faster...”

“And sexier” Ashlyn teased with a quiet giggle.

“Well I wasn’t gonna go there” Ali laughed out loud, happy to hear Ashlyn starting to come back to her normal attitude. “But, yeah, sexier works.”

“Elephants are your favorite animals and they are the best mothers on the planet, or so I’ve read” Ashlyn continued, smiling a little as she felt her temper and nerves settling back in to place.

“Babe, I love elephants more than a lot” Ali laughed again. “But they are definitely not sexy.”

“I’m not sure how we went from a fierce, protective mama bear...”

“Lioness” Ali interrupted and the keeper could practically hear the grin on her face.

“Fine” Ashlyn laughed and rolled her eyes. “I don’t know how we went from a fierce, protective lioness who defends her offspring against any threat no matter how big or small, to needing to be something sexy?”

“Hey, if you’re gonna compare me to a couple of wild animals I think I should be allowed to pick the sexiest one...”

They both laughed and then were quiet for a few seconds, just enjoying the connection even over the phone.

“Maybe what makes the mama bear, or even the mama elephant, sexy as hell is the way she protects us all” Ashlyn countered, her voice lowering as her emotions swelled a bit at the turn the conversation had taken. “Maybe it has nothing to do with how sleek her form is and everything to do with how brave her heart is.” 

“Ashlyn...” the brunette breathed out, “you always say the most beautiful things to me...” her voice choked off as she tried not to cry. “Honestly honey, thank you for always seeing the best parts of me, even when they’re hiding behind a whole bunch of other crap. I love you.”

15 minutes later Ali hustled into the large conference room downstairs in the first floor of the K-H office building. She slid into her seat just as the 11am staff meeting was about to begin, nodding at Marcy who was standing at the front of the room near the large video screen where almost all of their agents were signed in via remote devices. The weekly staff meetings were not optional and an agent in the field needed to have an excellent excuse to miss one. Marcy ran them, even when all of the shareholders: Ali, Ashlyn, Hilary, Jared and Whitney, were present. The Tuesday morning staff meetings were meant for the whole agent team to be able to share important information with their colleagues in real time, and for Marcy and the management team to pass along any big company news or changes or decisions. Email was great for most notifications, but something vital was always exchanged during those staff meetings and everyone agreed that they were important and helpful. The key to their success was that Marcy ran them like a general commanding her troops. They never went longer than an hour and that was by design. If someone started getting distracted or blathering on, she was quick to redirect them or flat out cut them off. She had observed Ali run them the first few months and had learned from the best.

“That’s something we can discuss offline” she would say, interrupting Jerry or Paige as they went off on a tangent. “Sela, I’m going to stop you there. You and Holly work on that when we’re done with this meeting.”

It stung when it happened to you, but they all appreciated it every time it happened to anybody else. Nobody wanted to listen to people just prattle on. They all had things to do and they respected the way Marcy handled every one of them exactly the same way. Nobody got away with wasting the group’s time. Not even Ali.

“Ali’s right, but now’s not the time to dig deeper into that” Marcy nodded at her boss in the room with her and then looked back at the screen with the other off-site agents. “We’ll get it worked out on our end and Jen will get back with you all and let you know how we want to handle it going forward. For the time being, keep doing what you’ve been doing. Understood?”

There were a chorus of affirmative responses and head nods, including one from the woman who had been cut off.

“Yes” Ali nodded, unfazed by what many CEOs may have interpreted as a slight. Ali knew Marcy was just doing exactly what the brunette had told her to do – keep the meeting on track and moving efficiently, no matter who was causing the delay. And because Marcy treated everybody the exact same way, no one saw it as anything other than supreme efficiency in action. None of the agents thought Marcy was being rude to Ali or that Ali had been belittled in any way. A large part of that was also because Ali, and the other shareholders, never reacted that way either. “Thanks Marce” she turned to the head agent next. “Jen, let’s talk after this.”

Lunch could be totally different every day of the week for Ali. She often met existing or potential clients for lunch, treating them to a delicious meal at a nice restaurant somewhere in Boston or Cambridge. Sometimes she met prospective employees for lunch, bringing Sutapa, K-H’s human resource manager, with her along with either Whitney, Jared, Marcy or Jen, depending on which department the hopeful applicant was being considered for. At least twice a week Ali ate lunch with Whitney, joined by Becca and Tommy who would come up and visit from the daycare downstairs. Those were Ali’s favorite lunches, unless Ashlyn came in for lunch – that was always better than anything else. On Tuesdays though, because of the staff meeting and the action items it always produced, Ali almost always had a working lunch. She would huddle up with the management team and try to tackle whatever issues had been brought up in the staff meeting so they could find a quick fix and get it implemented right away. Unlike so many other places that most of the K-H employees had worked, Ali and the management team made it a point to attack any problems or inefficiencies head on and in an expeditious manner. Most other companies shied away from problematic issues that had been brought up by their employees. But not K-H. Ali had always harped on acting swiftly and smartly when a problem presented itself. 

“They don’t get easier to handle as the hours tick by” she always preached about problems. “Knock em down right away, before they grow legs and get strong enough to kick you back.”

As they finished their working lunch that Tuesday, Whitney came back up from spending time in the daycare with her kids. She sat in the large conference room where Ali, Marcy, Jen, Sutapa and Jared had just enjoyed delicious salads from their favorite spot around the corner and smiled as she typed into her phone. Jared, Marcy and Sutapa filed out of the room, each with a short list of things to do from their lunch meeting. 

“What are you smiling at there Smiley McSmileyface?” Jen teased Whitney, one of her oldest and dearest friends and fellow UNC Tarheel. 

Jen had gone to college with both Whitney and Ashlyn and had been the very first agent K-H hired back when they started in 2017, before they had even moved into the garage of the big old house. Jen and Jared were the first two employees Ali and Ashlyn had brought in. They were their day-ones. 

“Oh, her silly wife” the lawyer bent her head towards Ali as she answered Jen.

“Oh geez, what’d she do now?” Ali chuckled as she began to tidy up the space, gathering up leftover lunch trash and wiping down the table.

“She’s freaking out about the Ellen Show” Whitney rolled her eyes and giggled. “She’s nervous already and it’s a whole month away.”

“Why though?” Jen shook her head in confusion. “She’s such a natural on camera. She always does such a great job, and Ellen freaking loves her.”

“I think that’s why” Whitney’s face softened as she started to talk about her bestie’s quirks and insecurities with two people who knew and loved her too. “She knows expectations are going to be high and she’s nervous about not meeting them” the lawyer shrugged and smiled.

Ellen DeGeneres would be turning 71 years old at the end of January and she had retired from her daily talk show several years earlier. She was probably the youngest old person the world had ever seen, especially on tv, but 71 was 71 and she wanted to take more time and spend it with her wife and extended family. What the comedian did instead was to tape a couple of specials each year that would air in primetime for massive audience numbers and television ratings. Ellen picked and chose her guests for those specials very carefully, knowing they were going to be seen by more people than usual. The shows were usually taped at a sound stage in Los Angeles but sometimes Ellen hosted guests at her own home, depending on what the show was going to entail. She liked to have a theme for each special and the one that Ashlyn had been invited to appear on was ‘Ellen’s favorite sports stars’. Ashlyn, Hilary Knight, Megan Rapinoe and her wife Sue Bird were going to be the guests for the special that would be taping out in Los Angeles on February 15th, and everybody knew it was sure to be an enormously fun time.

“Nah, she’s gonna be great. That show is gonna be hysterical no matter what happens” Jen enthused with a wide grin as she finished her lunch. “Are you going too Al or did you want me to go this time?” she asked with a wink.

Ali was technically Ashlyn’s agent and she fulfilled all of those duties with gusto. But when it came to travelling with the keeper for events or appearances, she often relied on Jen or one of the senior agents to go in her place. The brunette would have loved to travel with Ashlyn to all of her events and appearances, but it just wasn’t feasible with the four kids. Nor was it really necessary. The keeper was a pro and knew what she was doing and didn’t need a babysitter – which is what a lot of the agent’s work was with most athletes and clients. But if there was a trip for Ashlyn to take that could be turned into a weekend getaway for the busy moms, Ali would go and function as her agent.

“Well, since she’s my only client I feel like I should probably go with her” the brunette shrugged playfully and then giggled. 

“You’re gonna have a busy February” Whitney raised her eyebrows and met Ali’s gaze. “I’m exhausted just thinking about it” she chuckled.

“Ugh, I know” Ali groaned as she moved several of the conference table chairs back into place. “I’m just trying to get through this month first!”

“Why? What else besides the LA trip and your February vacation trip?” Jen asked, looking from one woman to the other.

“She’s got her big dinner and alumni award at Boston University in a couple of weeks to start February off. Then the LA trip, which includes Ash’s American Express commercial shoot before the Ellen Show gig. Then we’re doing the whole Disney World thing for February vacation” the lawyer spelled out.

“So the BU dinner is because of the BU alumnae magazine deal or vice versa?” Jen asked, still trying to sort out the whirlwind of accolades that were coming Ali’s way that winter.

“They’re not officially related, I mean, other than both being sponsored by BU” the brunette replied. “But let’s just say that I don’t think they’d be putting me on the cover of the BU alumnae magazine in March if I hadn’t won the alumnae achievement award and wasn’t doing the dinner and speech in February.”

“And I’m telling you” Whitney chimed in eagerly. “They’re late to the party and I think they realize it. It took Cambridge giving you the Businesswoman of the Year award to get your alma mater’s attention. Dummies” she shook her head, frustrated that it had taken their local communities so long to recognize what a positive impact Knight-Harris and Ali Krieger herself had had on the area. “But better late than never” she smiled warmly at the brunette. “I’m so happy for you Al.”

“For us Whit” Ali returned her heartfelt smile. “For us. None of those awards or dinners or magazine covers happen if Knight-Harris doesn’t do excellent work – and that means both of you, and everybody else too. I know it and I’m gonna make sure the rest of the world does too” she finished with conviction. “Well, at least the handful of people that’ll actually hear my two speeches” she giggled and both other women laughed along with her.

“And let’s not forget the rest of this month” Whit continued examining Ali and Ashlyn’s insanely busy schedule.

“The NWSL draft this Friday” Jen nodded knowingly because she was going to be making the trip to Portland for it as well, as were several other K-H agents.

The NWSL was still a major source of clients and revenue for K-H and it was still near and dear to all of them, for obvious reasons. Now that the twins were 5, Ali felt more comfortable leaving them for a few weekend trips or short work trips here and there. She had promised herself that she was going to attend the NWSL draft and the NWSL Championship Week events as often as possible going forward. This year, this coming Friday afternoon, would be the first NWSL draft she had attended in over a decade.

“Then Monday night is your Cambridge Businesswoman of the Year event” Whitney beamed at her friend, immensely proud of the brunette for the well-deserved recognition.

“Got your speech all ready?” Jen teased but there was nothing but friendship and respect behind it.

“Yeah, it’s coming along” Ali blushed. “The kids like it” she joked.

“Hey, that’s a tough crowd” Whitney chuckled. “If they like it then I’d say it’s gonna be a slam dunk.”

“And last but certainly not least, we’ve got the Suburu shoot up at Mount Washington next weekend” Ali sat down heavily, suddenly feeling overwhelmed by everything on her plate.

“With the kids, right?” Whitney clarified. “This is the snowy weather shoot they wanted to do with the kids and the dogs?”

“Oh yeah” Ali sighed and closed her eyes at the thought of wrangling kids and dogs on a commercial shoot. “What could possibly go wrong there?” They all laughed.

“Well, we’ve got your back” Jen nodded at her boss and friend. “Whatever you need while you’re out, we’re on it.”

The afternoon flew by with Ali sitting at her desk returning emails and sending out other correspondence required to keep the business moving smoothly. She spent a lot of time on a conference call about some newer technology that was supposed to make it easier for fans to interact with teams and athletes on social media. It was the next advancement in the interactive social media polls and questionnaires and it was supposed to be the next great thing.

“I don’t know Jared, what do you think?” she asked her long-time friend, brother-in-law’s brother, and K-H’s web guru after the call ended.

They were sitting on either side of Ali’s desk where they had both participated in the conference call. The office door was closed and it was almost 3pm. Jared Kimball, now 32 years old, was still an important part of the K-H management team as well as a vital part of the day to day operations. He had grown a little bit disenchanted with his daily duties and as soon as Ali had found out about it – from Kyle through Nathan Kimball via Iris Kimball, she had moved to correct the problem right away. Jared, after taking some time to get over feeling ambushed and betrayed by his mother, brother, and brother-in-law, finally admitted his growing discontent to Ali and Ashlyn back in November. He loved the higher-level things he was doing, like designing a lot of the web-based software the company used to track social media hits their website got every day. He was using his background and expertise in analytics to help improve the efficacy of the different social media platforms he designed and built over 11 years ago when he first started at K-H as a summer intern. What he didn’t like was the actual grunt work of managing the social media accounts. He had done it for so long, and done it so well – adopting the perfect tone...funny and sharp but never snarky, but he was just tired of it. It wasn’t easy to find just the right tone to use and still keep your posts funny, relevant and popular, but Jared had done it. He had done it so well, in fact, that he was finding it hard to get somebody new to pick up on it. Since his heart to heart talk in November with Ashlyn and Ali, Jared had been trying to hire two or three new people to take over those aspects of his job for him. Twitter was still so popular and still moved so fast that it required a full-time attendant all on its own. Jared had found one young woman who was working out well, so far. But he had gone through four other young men who just couldn’t quite fit into the position very well at all.

“Let me look into it deeper” he replied after taking a moment to consider what they had just learned about the new technology. “I’ll make some calls and find out if anybody knows anything besides what they’re selling to us” he nodded thoughtfully as he made some notes in his smart phone.

“Before you go, can I talk to you for a minute?” Ali asked after giving him some time to complete his notes.

“Sure thing Al, what’s up?”

“I know you’ve been working hard trying to get that second spot filled” she began with an uncomfortable frown on her face.

“Yeah, Bryce isn’t cutting it, is he?” Jared sighed, knowing exactly what the brunette was going to say. “I’ve talked with him twice about the tone of his posts but he’s still not getting it.”

“I’m all for giving people time to let them acclimate to what we do here and how we do it, but it’s time to pull the plug” she leaned forward on her desk, resting her elbows on it and meeting Jared’s frustrated eyes. “He’s too bitchy. And if you’ve already talked with him about it...”

“Twice” Jared raised his eyebrows to emphasize his own disappointment in the hire that he thought was going to finally be a good fit.

“Yeah, then it’s definitely not gonna work” Ali shook her head again. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. I’m sorry I keep fucking that spot up.”

“Hey, don’t do that” Ali quirked her eyebrow at the young man. “Those are some big-ass shoes you’re asking him to fill” she winked at him and then smiled.

“Which post was the one that finally pushed you over the edge?” he asked curiously.

“The Tierna Davidson one” Ali shook her head in disgust. 

Davidson had turned 30 years old last Fall and after being one of the most talented and beloved players in recent history on the USWNT she had experienced a decline in her skills during the past NWSL season. She had suffered a torn ACL a couple of years earlier and she had just never been quite the same player after that. So many players came back better and stronger after having their knees repaired but not every one of them was a success story. Tierna’s knee didn’t respond as well as hoped and she never made it back to the USWNT. She had spent the past two seasons in the NWSL for her hometown California team, the LA Strikers, and was easily one of the most popular players in the entire league, USWNT player or not. During the playoffs in October her #4 ranked LA team had travelled to Houston and been beaten by the #1 ranked Dash. In the game Tierna had been embarrassed on a play, losing her footing and ending up on her face inside the 6-yard box while her mark scored a goal. It had been one of those moments where everybody cringed, Dash and Strikers fans alike. Nobody wanted to see one of the best and most beloved players in the league get schooled like that. All of social media, at the time, had treated the moment with kid gloves, allowing it to fly under the radar without calling Davidson out and adding to her embarrassment. All except one dumb woso journalist who was more of a troublemaking hack that everybody else did their best to not engage with. He made a post about it, calling out the failed moment and including a photo of Davidson eating grass after her mark had turned her and went around her for everyone to see. Back in October when it happened, the post was mocked and the woso hack derided as the bottom-feeder that he always had been. Jared Kimball had never touched it and never would because there wasn’t anything good to say about it and nothing funny to be made out of it either. Nobody wanted to see one of the greats like that. Nobody. There wasn’t much that woso fans unanimously agreed on, but making fun of Tierna Davidson was one of them. 

New guy Bryce didn’t seem to understand that. New guy Bryce had been tasked with producing an Instagram poll about some of the best and worst plays of the previous NWSL season for Knight-Harris in an effort to drum up some more excitement for the upcoming NWSL draft this weekend. There would be a different poll every day this week until the draft on Friday. Bryce had decided to include the photo and post of Davidson’s ugly moment as one of two ‘worst defensive plays of the season’ and that had been all Ali could take. It had gone up last night and the brunette made sure to talk to Jared about it today, as soon as she possibly could.

“Yeah, I cringed when I saw that” Jared dropped his eyes.

“You and everybody else except the jackass that originally posted it back in October” Ali huffed.

“I’m sorry Al...”

“It’s not your fault” she replied kindly. “But if he can’t tell that that wasn’t something to bring back to life then he’s not our guy.”

“Totally agree” Jared nodded.

“And can you make sure there’s one more category in our poll this week, today if possible but tomorrow at the latest?”

“Yes. ‘Which of these posts was the stupidest thing K-H posted so far this year?’ sound about right?” he tilted his head questioningly at the brunette who was smiling back at him. “Without reposting the picture again, obviously.”

“Obviously.”

Ali hoped Jared Kimball would never leave K-H but she half-expected him to at some point in the near future. He would be irreplaceable and they would suffer through many attempts by other people who just didn’t have his wit and skill and work ethic to do just that. Jared had always been on the same wavelength as Ali, at least in terms of the way the company presented itself to the rest of the world, the way K-H looked and sounded. The brunette had always appreciated it and had been vocal about it, often using Jared as an example of the kind of seamless collaboration that she wanted for all of the different departments of K-H. Maybe she was wrong and Jared wouldn’t go do his own thing. Maybe. It was a heartache for another day, whenever it happened.

As she watched him walk out of her office, leaving the door open at her request, Ali saw a text come in on her phone and took a minute to check it. Ashlyn had sent her a sexy, slow-moving gif of a naked woman straddling another naked woman, sitting up tall on her lap and grinding away. The woman on top had one hand grabbing at her own breast while her other hand rubbed her own clit. The woman beneath reclined with her hands joined behind her head in a relaxed and voyeuristic pose. It was hard to tell if there was a strap-on involved because their bodies were so closely joined, but, as Ali turned her phone to the side to flip the screen and make the hot image bigger, she could see the black strap at the side of the bottom woman’s hip.

“Damn...” she mumbled to herself as she felt a pang in her core.

It was already 3:40pm and Ali tried to leave the office by 4pm every day, 3:30pm if she could do it. The drive took an hour without any traffic and if she left at 3:30pm she could still get away from the city before getting stuck in the gridlock. It had been a busy day and the brunette would only be in the office one more day before flying to Portland Thursday for the NWSL draft with the rest of the K-H contingent. Any thoughts she had about staying until 4pm had disappeared as soon as she saw the sexy gif from her wife. Ashlyn knew her so well. She knew what turned her on and, more importantly, that Ali didn’t care how sexy the gif was – if it was moving too fast it was worthless to her. Her keeper had found a super sexy gif that was moving at a nice slow speed and it had definitely had the desired effect on her. Ali texted her wife back as she swallowed hard, amazed at how horny she had become. Just like that.

Aliebe: Hey sexy. Looks like fun. Which one am I?  
Ashlyn: ...

Ali waited a minute as she closed out some computer programs on her laptop and packed things up to leave the office, but there was no reply back. 

Aliebe: You’re such a tease. Lol. Brat. How am I supposed to focus on anything now that all I can think about is you...and that?   
Ashlyn: ...

Still no reply. The brunette knew better than to take it personally. Ashlyn was in the middle of the kids’ group music lesson up in Rockport and one of the other moms could easily have been bending her ear as they waited for the hour-long lesson to finish. And it was going to be a busy night with Ashlyn and Josie going to basketball practice right after dinner too. Ali knew it was going to be a tough night for them to enjoy some sexy times. But she was definitely going to try. She could feel how wet her panties were as she sat in the driver’s seat to start her commute home. 

Aliebe: Hey, I’m on my way home. Need anything? Want me to pick up dinner?  
Ashlyn: ...  
Aliebe: For the record, you suck for sending me that and then going radio silent. And you’ll pay...

When Ali finally got home it was almost 5:15pm, her hopes of getting home closer to 4:45 dashed by the incompetence, or indifference, of the woman at the dry cleaners. It was a family-run business and the Kriegers had been using them ever since Ali had started working at K-H full time, 10 years ago, but the brunette didn’t recognize the unhelpful woman behind the counter that afternoon. She brought Ali the wrong clothes the first time, then only brought her half of the correct clothes the second time. If Ali hadn’t been paying close attention she wouldn’t have realized the mistake. And that would have been bad because the clothes Ashlyn planned to wear on stage for the draft Friday afternoon were in the forgotten half. By the time Ali left the dry cleaner she was fuming at the horrible service and at the length of time it had taken her to make the stop. There was no way she’d be able to make a quick dinner now. She wasn’t expected to make dinner, but on Ashlyn’s busy Tuesdays she tried her best to be as helpful and present as possible. The whole week was a little bit out of whack because of the Portland trip but Ali had really wanted and tried to be home in time to make dinner tonight.

When she opened the mudroom door with the heavy dry cleaning over her shoulder, Ali was struck square in the chest by screaming, yelling and other loud, angry noises from both the kitchen and the front living room. She took a deep breath and girded her loins for battle, draping the dry cleaning over the back of the desk chair in the mudroom for the time being and putting her briefcase and purse on the bench by the wall. She looked to her right, into the kitchen, and saw Dodge crying as he sat in the timeout chair on the far side of the double-sided fireplace. There was a burned smell coming from the stovetop and the brunette noted Fred licking up something from the floor in front of the appliance. Ali looked to her left, still from her position in the middle of the mudroom, and saw Lily sitting in the recliner with her arms crossed and her face beet red and covered in still-flowing tears. Both twins were obviously upset and screaming their pain or anger or both out of their wide-open mouths. Persey appeared at the end of the mudroom by the first-floor bathroom and the front hall, her head hung low and her tail between her legs. The sensitive dog hated when there was any yelling or trouble in the big old house but was unable to give herself any comfort when the situation arose. She wanted to be near her people, but she hated the ruckus and the stress that came with it during those times. She trotted towards Ali as soon as she saw her and stood between her legs – her go-to spot when she was frightened or anxious.

“Hey Perse, what’s going on girl, huh?” Ali patted the dog’s head quickly as she made her decision and moved into the front living room. They rarely used the recliner as an auxiliary timeout location so she felt pretty confident that Lily was the victim of whatever had happened. “Hi baby girl...”

“Mommy!” Lily wailed, her arms outstretched and her head tilted back into the back of the chair as her tears continued to fall.

“Shhhh...it’s ok. Stop crying now and breathe for me honey” she soothed as she sat in the chair and moved the girl to her lap. “Just calm down and breathe.”

Lily sucked in big breaths and after a couple of seconds buried her face into Ali’s chest as the brunette wrapped her arms around her and held her close. Ali heard her daughter sniffling and trying to catch her breath as they sat together for a minute. She could still hear Dodge crying in the kitchen but he too had slowed down and gotten a bit quieter. There was still no sign of Ashlyn, Josie or Drew and Ali was curious and a little annoyed. Most of her annoyance was simply from not knowing what was going on. Both moms had been played by all the kids in similar situations over the years. It was really difficult to tell who the culprit was and who the poor victim was in times like these. Both twins needed comforting, that was clear, and as soon as Lily had stopped crying and moved to small whimpers and sniffles, Ali got up to go check on her son.

“Mommy, don’t leave me” Lily whined as she leaned back into the chair.

Fred ambled into the room to greet Ali at that precise moment and the brunette took advantage.

“Here sweetie” she patted Fred’s soft head in greeting as she moved to the middle of the room. “Fred’s going to keep you company while I check on your brother.”

The sweet dog did just that. He was always the one to stick his big face right into any disturbance there was if somebody was hurt or upset. He rested his chin on Lily’s leg and then sat down right in that spot once she reached her small hand out to pet him. As she walked through the kitchen, Ali stopped quickly at the stove to make sure everything was turned off and not still burning whatever dinner had tried to be. After a quick glance at the floor where Fred had left the few strands of spaghetti that he couldn’t lick up, the brunette knew that Ashlyn had attempted to make spaghetti and meatballs for the kids. She turned to look at the microwave and saw it blinking ‘DONE’ which meant the meatballs were finished being heated up.

“Hi big boy” Ali squatted in front of Dodge, her suit skirt keeping her knees together and making it more difficult than it had to be. “You ok?” she asked quietly as she cupped his big red cheeks and used her fingers to wipe away the tears there.

Dodge’s beautiful clear blue eyes blinked back at her and she frowned when she saw the heavy tear that was still hanging on to his long eyelashes. He had stopped crying but he was breathing heavily and unevenly and as Ali studied his face he hiccupped loudly and grimaced. It must have been one of those painful hiccups because ordinarily he thought hiccups were hysterical whether he had them or one of his other family members did. His bottom lip quivered and Ali thought he might start crying again. She leaned over and kissed his forehead, murmuring against it at the same time.

“Just try and be still, love. Calm down and take some deep breaths ok?” she leaned back again and saw him nod his head which made the one big tear drop from his lashes land on his lap.

He scooted closer to the edge of the chair and Ali got on her knees and gave him the hug he was looking for. She almost cried herself when he gently patted her back with his strong hands. That was her kryptonite with him. There was something each kid did that broke Ali’s heart open, every time. With Dodge it had always been those little pats that he had given since he was a baby. Everybody loved it when he did it because it didn’t appear to be a conscious decision on his part. His little wrists just bent up and down whenever he was hugging somebody he loved in a meaningful situation. Most of his hugs were fast and rough but sometimes, if you were lucky, you’d get one of his sweet hugs and they often came with those little pats. They were by far the most gentle movements he ever made, unless he was asleep or half-asleep. 

As damning as his position in the timeout chair was, Ali couldn’t bring herself to limit his time in the hug and felt guilty for a minute. Every mother’s nightmare was fighting children. Determining if anybody was physically hurt and needed medical attention, and then trying to figure out who had been at fault were only the beginning of the myriad emotions moms went through when their own kids fought with each other.

“Mommy!” Josie called out brightly as she hopped to the floor behind Ali at the bottom of the back stairs, already dressed in her basketball clothes.

“Keep moving Jose” Ashlyn urged, her tense voice still inside the backstairs and out of sight.

Ali slid Dodge back into place at the back of the timeout chair, squeezed his arm and then stood up to receive Josie’s eager hug and kiss her red head.

“Hi little one, how are you doing?”

“Good” Josie nodded, still in the hug.

Ali’s eyes tried to meet her wife’s but Ashlyn had moved fast through the kitchen to the fridge where she spoke to her daughter without taking her eyes from the offerings inside.

“Ok Jo, we only have 15 minutes so I need you to sit down and eat. Do you want string cheese with your meatballs?”

Ali patted the top of the small two-person table in front of the fireplace for Josie to sit down as she crossed to the microwave on the counter near the kitchen sink. She checked the meatballs and put them back in for 20 seconds to re-warm them.

“Mama, are we eating soon?” Drew’s voice came from between the dining room and the family room as he came up the basement steps and walked towards the kitchen.

“Hi sweet boy” Ali smiled when she saw her oldest son appear between the fireplace and the pantry, leaning on the counter with the coffee maker near the refrigerator. “Let us get Josie fed and off to practice” she walked towards him and gave him a hug, rubbing his back and smiling down at him. “Then I’ll feed you guys.”

“But I’m hungry” he whined.

“Me too. I’m hungry too” Dodge added, sitting up straighter in the timeout chair in an effort to make his voice heard.

“You both heard your mother” Ashlyn barked out, clearly still aggravated by whatever had gone on before Ali had arrived home. “It won’t be long, but you’re just gonna have to wait” she handed Josie the string cheese and then went to the microwave as it beeped. 

Ali, still in her work clothes, complete with snot from two different children spread across the lapel of her suit jacket and blouse, quickly started a fresh pot of spaghetti and another one of sauce. She took her suit jacket off and draped it over the back of the chair across from Josie and was surprised to feel Ashlyn’s hands on her waist and her lips on her cheek.

“Hi baby” the keeper exhaled as she hugged her wife quickly from behind. “I’m sorry everything’s a mess...”

“You sit and eat too” Ali turned in her wife’s arms and kissed her softly on the lips. “Come on...”

The brunette looked into the fridge and frowned. Wednesdays were usually the days Ashlyn went grocery shopping and things were a little light in the food department that Tuesday evening. She silently cursed herself for not just bringing home dinner. Then she cursed again at the stupid dry cleaning bimbo who had delayed her arrival time by at least 20 minutes.

“How about a burrito?” she asked as she looked in the freezer. “We have sour cream too...” she confirmed as she pulled the fridge door open again.

“Sold” Ashlyn chuckled and shook her head as she watched Josie hungrily gobble up the meatballs, sliced apples and string cheese in front of her.

“Can I have some milk please?” the redhead asked.

“Drew, bring your sister a chocolate milk please” Ali nodded at the boy who had stuck to his spot by the counter.

He grumbled a little bit as he pulled a container of milk out of the cupboard and walked it over to the small table. 

“Thank you” Ali smiled at him as she walked past the table to put the burrito into the microwave. “Now can you get the sour cream out of the fridge and bring it and a spoon to the table for Mama?”

“Why do I have to do it?” he complained, but it was only a half-hearted gripe.

“Because I asked you to” Ali shot him a warning look. “And because we’re on a time deadline and we need to work together.”

“Can I get up now??” Lily’s loud voice came into the room all the way from the front living room.

Ali stopped next to the table and looked down at her wife, searching her face for the answer. The next fifteen minutes were spent with Josie and Ashlyn eating as quickly as they could, while Ali made dinner for the rest of the kids and cleaned up the mess on the kitchen floor. Lily had been allowed to join them in the kitchen as long as none of them touched anybody else, at all, anywhere, with anything. Josie had once gotten around the ‘no touching anybody else’ command by using a long stick to poke Dodge so they’d had to update the rules. Technically she hadn’t touched him, not with her own body. By the time Ali helped Josie into her sneakers in the mudroom, reminding her to be careful of her upper lip that was almost all healed up from last week’s mishap, Ashlyn had relayed the Reader’s Digest version of what had happened between them arriving home after group music lesson at 4:15 and Ali’s arrival an hour later. 

Neither twin would tell her exactly what had happened after she broke up a pretty severe wrestling match turned fist-fight turned hair-pulling event in the front living room while she had been trying to make dinner and get Josie ready for basketball. Drew had been in the basement playing video games and had missed the whole thing. And Josie had been trying to start her homework in the dining room and, for once, was unable to tattle. The one time Ashlyn really could have used her. But both Dodge and Lily were screaming bloody murder, crying profusely, and heaving breathlessly as if they had just gone 12 rounds in a prize fight. So Ashlyn had punished them both. It was hard for her to do that because she always felt bad for the innocent party who was being unjustly treated, but if nobody would talk then that was what happened. Ali had walked in right after Ashlyn had taken Josie up to get her changed for basketball and the timeouts were fresh and new.

“Have fun you two” she waved at Ashlyn and Josie from the mudroom door as they trotted towards Ashlyn’s jeep in the driveway. She turned and went back into the kitchen where Drew and Lily were washing their hands at the sink while Dodge did the same in the first-floor bathroom. “Ok you guys, let’s eat. I’m starving” she announced as she plated the spaghetti and meatballs after hastily cutting everything up into bite-sized pieces.

By 7:15pm when Ashlyn and Josie returned home, Ali had managed to feed the kids and herself, change out of her work clothes, and complete showertime for the three kids in her charge. She groaned heavily as she sat in one of the dining room chairs to help the kids with their homework while Ashlyn took Josie up and gave her a shower. It was just one of those days. An unyielding, exhausting span of hours that presented one challenge after another with no relief in sight. Well, that wasn’t true. Eventually the kids would have to go to sleep. That was when the two moms could put the house back together, get lunches made for tomorrow, do some laundry, make sure the dogs felt like they still mattered, and maybe even pay some bills and RSVP to some kid party and event invitations that were due soon. Only then, after all of those things had been completed, could they relax. 

“Ewww, what is this?” Ali groaned for what felt like the 10th time in the 5 hours she had been home. 

When they finally settled together onto the big L shaped couch in the front living room there had been a sloshing sound when Ashlyn joined her. The brunette could see...something pinkish between the couch cushions as she pulled on the edge of the one closest to her.

“What the fuck is that?” Ashlyn jumped up as if she had just been bitten in the ass.

As her mind churned furiously trying to figure out the answer to the gross new riddle, Ali suddenly felt like crying. It was 10:15pm and whatever this was, it was just too much.

“Is it Lily’s slime?” the keeper asked as she brought her face down closer to the substance, hoping for the best.

Ali closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the couch in defeat. She was done. For one of the rare times in her adult life, she was seriously considering leaving the mess – whatever it was – there until tomorrow. If it had been one day later in the week and tomorrow was Thursday then she was pretty sure that’s exactly what she would have done. Marisol could have had the pleasure in the morning when she came to clean the big old house. Who was she kidding? Ali could never do that and she knew it.

“Oh God, it’s not Lily’s slime” Ashlyn choked out, gagging as she lifted her fingers out from between the cushions after bravely touching the mystery goo.

Ali opened her eyes quickly and couldn’t believe that her squeamish wife had done the dirty work this time. Ashlyn had always chickened out when it came to finding foreign or unrecognizable things in and around the house. It had always been the brunette who had to kill the spiders and house centipedes and stick her finger into whatever sticky substance was in question. Ashlyn was fearless enough to play a game of chicken with an out of control car with their baby son on her back, but she was a complete wuss when it came to gross stuff at home. To see her there, that particular night when everything had been so difficult all evening long, valiantly trying to do more so her beautiful brunette didn’t have to...well, Ali was very moved by her keeper.

“Aw babe, you touched it” her face instantly softened and her lips turned up into a sweet smile as she gazed up at the blonde hovering above the couch.

“I really thought it was Lily’s slime” Ashlyn swallowed awkwardly again and looked like she might throw up.

“Alright” Ali grunted as she lifted her suddenly very heavy body up off the couch. She was pretty sure the only reason she had the strength and determination to do it was because Ashlyn had just been so chivalrous. “Let’s just fucking get it over with” she sighed.

“Wait” the keeper cocked her head and brought her sticky fingers closer to her nose.

Ali raised her eyebrows in surprise as she watched.

“It’s Drew’s smoothie” Ashlyn nodded and took a bigger whiff. “Yep. That kid never ever finishes anything” she clenched her jaw in frustration. “I let him bring the rest of his smoothie from before music lesson into the house” she rolled her eyes.

“And he went right downstairs and left it up here for the twins to knock over” Ali sighed, knowing exactly what must have happened.

“So where is it now?” they both looked around the room, hoping to find the plastic cup with the straw poking out of the lid somewhere in plain sight.

An hour later, after cleaning up the mess in the couch and locating the now empty plastic cup – evidence - in the trash can, which was another problem because it was supposed to be in the recycling bin, both moms finally made their way into their pajamas and their bed. So much for spending a little time with each other and talking about their days or the kids or anything else for that matter. They were both so wiped out that it was all they could do to lift their heads and kiss one another goodnight. 

“Goodnight baby, I love you” Ashlyn murmured against her wife’s soft lips as they lay on their sides facing each other. 

Ashlyn could tell the brunette had something she wanted to say or talk about just by the way she had positioned herself. If Ali was ready to go to sleep she curled on her left side so Ashlyn could spoon her from behind, or else she rolled onto her right side and wrapped herself around the blonde in her favorite sleeping position. When she faced her the way she was tonight, on her right side but with space between them, it meant she was trying to stay awake long enough to tell her something or share something with her.

“Mmmmm...love you too” Ali mumbled, struggling to keep her eyes open, even though she wanted nothing more than to have a few sweet moments with her wife. Her eyelids felt like lead though and kept closing no matter how hard she tried to keep them up. “You’re mean though...” 

“What?” Ashlyn smiled at how absolutely adorable her wife was as she fought her exhaustion. “What did I do?” she leaned forward and kissed Ali’s nose, bringing her hand up and brushing the dark hair away from her face and over her shoulder.

Ali nuzzled into the contact, allowing her eyes to close for a second while she reached forward and let her hand rest against her keeper’s chest, up high near her throat. She could feel Ashlyn’s heartbeat through the palm of her hand and it made her instinctively move her body closer to it. She intertwined their legs beneath the covers and let Ashlyn’s strong arm pull their bodies flush against each other. The brunette opened her eyes, her face only an inch away from the woman she loved more with every passing day.

“Hi” she breathed out, a slow grin trying to form on her lips.

“Hi” Ashlyn smiled and gave her lips an innocent kiss. “Why am I mean?”

“Oh yeah” one of Ali’s eyebrows went up as she finally got the grin to work across her face. “You big jerk” she spoke slowly and sleepily but kept smiling. “Sending me that and then disappearing on me” she tried to pout but her face just wasn’t responding the way it normally did. It was getting slack as her body started to shut down for the night. “Meanie.”

“What?” Ashlyn frowned in genuine confusion and chuckled. “Disappearing?”

“The text you sent me...” Ali’s eyelids drooped again.

Ashlyn furrowed her brow as she tried to figure out what the hell her wife was talking about.

“Oh, that gif!” the keeper’s face erupted into a huge grin, her dimple appearing but halfway buried by the pillow beneath her cheek. “I totally forgot about that” she chuckled again and pressed a kiss into Ali’s forehead. “That got your attention, did it?”

“It did” Ali giggled and brought their lips together in a soft, slow kiss, letting her keeper do most of the work. “It did things to me” she moved her leg between both of Ashlyn’s, keeping her eyes closed and loving the way her wife was methodically rubbing her back with her strong hands.

“What kind of things?” Ashlyn’s voice was low and her breath was hot as her words hit the brunette in the face, still so close to her own.

“Mmmmm...” Ali hummed her approval at the lovely touches that were starting to make her skin tingle. “I had to drive all the way home with soaking wet panties...”

It was Ashlyn’s turn to respond to her wife and she moaned softly and closed her eyes as she took in Ali’s words. 

“I thought you’d like that” she purred back to the brunette, letting her hand slide all the way down to Ali’s ass and giving it a gentle squeeze through her soft pajama bottoms. “Where were you when you got it?”

“At my desk, just finished a meeting with Jared...” Ali replied before giving her wife another kiss.

“Well Jared’s not very sexy” Ashlyn chuckled. “Let’s leave him out of this.”

“Ok” Ali nodded slightly, smiling again with closed eyes.

“And I won’t tell you how I almost got caught sending you that during the music lesson” she giggled and then sucked in a sharp breath when she felt Ali’s thigh pressing right up against her core. “Fuck Al, you’d better stop that unless you’re just planning to torture me. And you’d better not be doing that” she breathed out hotly and grabbed a big handful of the brunette’s ass, making Ali moan loudly.

“I wouldn’t do that” Ali chuckled and pressed her thigh harder against her wife’s warm center, wishing there were no sleep shorts or pajama pants between them. “That would be mean” she leaned forward and gave Ashlyn a deep, passionate kiss while moving her hand to her keeper’s breast and teasing all around it with her fingertips. 

Ashlyn felt her own tired body come back to life but was still unsure of what exactly the brunette had in mind. She was surprised that Ali was still even awake, forget about talking and kissing and teasing. She tried to temper her excitement in case this was a false start. It was obvious that Ali wanted to have sex that night but it was also very clear that she couldn’t even keep her eyes open. The keeper played it as cool as she could with Ali’s lips and thigh and fingertips working their magic on her. 

As soon as the sexy kiss ended and they were catching their breath, Ali made things very clear for her slightly conflicted wife.

“Put your fingers inside me” she husked out, pinching Ashlyn’s nipple and making her squirm at the touch.

“Are you sure?”

“Don’t be mean...” she teased as she worked her hand down between their bodies and into the front of her keeper’s sleep shorts with another moan.

That was all Ashlyn needed. She had her green light and stepped on the gas.

“I could never be mean to you” she mumbled against Ali’s neck as she slid her lips across her jaw towards her ear. “Whatever you want baby, it’s yours” she said and groaned when she felt the brunette’s fingers raking through her short hairs.

“I want you to hold me and fuck me” Ali moaned into her wife’s mouth as they began kissing again while their hands and fingers worked inside waist bands and around fabric.

They kept moving together slowly and methodically, panting into each other’s face when they would separate their mouths for air as they started their climb towards release. Ashlyn watched her wife’s face and smiled at the fact that her eyes hadn’t opened once. Those beautiful cinnamon orbs might have been too tired but her fingers and hips and all of her lips certainly weren’t.

“God you feel good” the keeper whispered against Ali’s mouth and then licked the brunette’s lips making her groan.

“Fuck Ash...Mmmmm...just like that...” Ali canted her hips to try and give her wife a better angle as Ashlyn’s long fingers moved inside her. She shuddered when the heel of her keeper’s palm hit her clit and then pressed against it as she changed her finger movement to a ‘come hither’ motion inside her. “Jesus...fuck...I love your fingers, your hands...so good babe.”

“You’re so wet” Ashlyn moaned when she felt Ali squeeze her fingers with her pussy. “Is this how wet you were when you got my text?” she teased seductively, her voice much lower than usual because she was so turned on.

“Yes” Ali gasped her reply as she felt the orgasm starting to take shape someplace still far away. “Mmmm...I thought...” she swallowed and tried to catch her breath, loving that Ashlyn’s face was still only an inch away from hers. “I thought...I would soak my skirt...you always make me so fucking wet. Your text was good...but I got wet imagining you...underneath me...”

“While you touched yourself, all for me?”

“Yes, yes, fuck yes...I know you love that...”

“And I know you love riding me...” it was Ashlyn’s turn to start losing herself in the incredible feelings coming from between her legs. Ali’s nimble fingers had her more than worked up and ready for some clitwork of her own. Her voice cracked as she spoke again. “Were you riding that knobby strap-on of yours? So thick. Mmmmm...I love watching that pump into your sweet pussy...”

“Fuck, Ashlyn...” Ali gasped again and they both felt her leg tremble in the mess of limbs between them. “Oh yes, I rode you so hard...and then I leaned back so you...” she gulped for air as her chest started to heave. “So you could see my clit...as I rubbed it for you...all for you baby.”

Ali was at a slight disadvantage because her left hand was on top and that was the one she was using between her wife’s long, strong legs. Normally she liked to use her strong hand when she fucked Ashlyn but nothing about the sex they were having that night was planned or perfect. This was one of their sloppy, sleepy sexy times that were never ideal but sometimes necessary. Doors didn’t get locked, pajamas stayed on bodies, in Ali’s case tonight – tired eyes stayed closed. Even though these nights weren’t perfect they never failed to satisfy. The orgasms were never huge but they were always there, even when one or the other of the two moms thought they might not get there. Whoever was struggling to get there just focused on delivering the orgasm to the other, and the sexy way they came was usually enough to bring the struggler with them. Both Ali and Ashlyn would still say watching the other person orgasm was the sexiest thing they could possibly see. Sometimes that’s all it took on a night like this when nothing else was ideal. 

As she felt her body responding to her wife’s talented hand, Ali squeezed her right arm down between their bodies and just managed to get her fingers on Ashlyn’s aching clit. She circled it a few times and chuckled when she felt her keeper’s hips surge forward, looking for more pressure. 

“Shit, yeah” Ashlyn gasped, her eyes darkening even more even though her wife couldn’t see them. “Yeah...fuck yeah...” she groaned, trying to shift her position a little bit and make Ali’s fingers touch her where she really wanted her.

All of the clit talk had made them both painfully aware of how badly they wanted theirs rubbed. Ashlyn held her hand steady so her two middle fingers were still deep inside her wife’s throbbing pussy. She bent her fingers up, fast and hard, into Ali’s g-spot while she pressed the heel of her palm against her swollen clit. She squeezed against Ali’s clit at the same time she pressed up into her g-spot as if she were trying to touch her fingertips to her palm like spiderman shooting his web. The key difference being that the brunette’s sensitive parts were all getting an amazing fucking and there was no web involved.

“Please babe” Ali bit her bottom lip and pushed hard against her wife’s strong hand. “Make me come...I’m ready...I love you...you feel so fucking good...make me feel good too...please...”

The desperation in Ali’s voice took the blonde by surprise and spurred her on even more. Her own lust and want jumped up and made her head swim with desire as they continued moving together. Ashlyn grunted her approval when she felt the brunette’s fingers finally rub against her clit, sending intense pleasure through her body. 

“Come on, come all over my fingers...fuck...” Ashlyn brought their lips together hard in a bruising kiss that caught the brunette by surprise.

“Oh...mmmmm...mmmm...” she hummed into the fierce kiss once she recovered from the shock. 

That kiss was unlike anything else they had shared that night. It wasn’t sleepy at all and it made Ali’s fingers work harder and faster against her wife’s soft flesh. It only took another two minutes of gasping and grinding and rubbing and squeezing before Ashlyn came with another grunt.

“Aliiii...” she cried out as the orgasm took over.

Ashlyn buried her face in Ali’s neck as her body shook and then she bit down hard.

“Fuck! Yes...yes...oh God...” the brunette’s eyes flew open for the first time since they had faced each other in bed almost 20 minutes earlier. 

She groaned as her own orgasm followed after the bite and another few seconds of pressure on her clit. Her eyes stayed focused on Ashlyn’s face the whole time. They shook and twitched together, never moving more than the inch apart from each other. Ashlyn brought her other hand up to hold the back of her wife’s head and keep them from smacking their heads together as they rode out their highs. They gradually moved their hands up to hug and hold each other as they tried to catch their breath, panting the same air again and loving every minute of it. Ali licked her fingers clean and then cupped her wife’s cheek, smiling as their eyes finally met.

“I love you so much” the brunette said emotionally and Ashlyn thought her wife might cry as she sometimes did after an orgasm. But she didn’t. She tilted her head and blinked at her keeper through her lashes as she gently caressed her face with her fingertips.

“I love you too” Ashlyn returned the small but heartfelt smile, meeting her wife’s lovestruck gaze. 

They were quiet for a few minutes as their heartrates came back down and their breathing levelled out. They straightened out their pajamas as best they could without actually standing up to do so, neither of them willing to leave the cozy bed and the sweet and sexy afterglow. It wasn’t the best sex they had ever had but it was the best they could do for that night, in that moment. The fact that Ali had fought so hard to stay awake for her in the first place meant the world to Ashlyn, anything after the sweet conversation had been icing on the cake. But it was pretty awesome icing if the keeper did say so herself. Anytime they managed to give each other an orgasm on a night like tonight after a day like today was a thrill and a win and they both hoped that would never change.

“I’m sorry” Ali mumbled, struggling against her heavy eyelids again. “I can’t keep my eyes open...”

“It’s ok honey” Ashlyn kissed her forehead, smiling into it and making Ali hum in contentment. “I know. I can’t believe you pulled that off” the keeper chuckled and then smiled when she saw her wife’s face try, and fail, to form an indignant pout. “Let’s go to sleep now. My queen needs her rest.”

She meant it as a sweet joke, but they both knew how sincere Ashlyn’s words really were. She did worship Ali and everybody who was close to them knew it. Ashlyn didn’t care. She couldn’t imagine anything stopping her from loving and worshipping her incredible wife. 

“You’re my queen too” the brunette offered quietly, her eyes closed again. 

It was only four words but they carried so much more with them and both women knew it. It had always been the keeper’s thing to call Ali her princess and then her queen, but the brunette loved Ashlyn just as fiercely and devotedly and purely as any fabled knight or king could ever love their queen. Ashlyn was the one who spoke freely about her love and used cute, sweet nicknames for her wife and brought out the grand gestures when she needed them. It was a big, beautiful love that matched the keeper’s bold personality. But Ali was quieter and more reserved in almost every single way, including the way she showed her undying love for her beloved wife. Hers was a quieter, more constant sort of love that suited the brunette’s personality better. She wasn’t afraid to show people that she loved Ashlyn and she wasn’t embarrassed about it in any way. It wasn’t about that. It was more about the every day way they loved each other. Being a parent and raising kids was a grind, plain and simple. Both moms knew it and accepted it, gladly sacrificing time and dignity and privacy and independence to do it. Ashlyn found ways to pepper the grind with her love. If it were a graph, Ashlyn’s line would have higher peaks than Ali’s line. But Ali’s line would be more constant and steady. The brunette found ways to weave her love for Ashlyn in and through the grind until it was almost impossible to separate the two. One way wasn’t better than the other, they were just different. The main similarity was that they both absolutely adored the other and would do anything for each other as long as they had breath in their body. Ali knew she was Ashlyn’s queen because the keeper never tired of telling her. But the quiet brunette had learned over the years that sometimes her softer, steadier love could leave her keeper wondering during her weaker moments. Ali had been trying to make sure to remind the love of her life that she was just that – the love of her fucking life and the person she would still choose to be with 24 hours a day if she could.

“I am huh?” Ashlyn smirked a little at the sweet sentiment from her tired wife.

“You are and you rule my kingdom and I don’t want you to ever forget that” Ali couldn’t stifle the yawn that had been threatening to escape for the past minute. “Sorry” she shrugged sheepishly and opened her eyes one last time to look at her gorgeous keeper. “You mean everything to me Ashlyn. Absolutely everything.”

They smiled sweetly and knowingly at each other as another yawn forced its way out of the brunette.

“Let’s go to sleep now, sugarplum” Ashlyn suggested again and started to move onto her back so Ali could cuddle into her side.

“Ok, but...” Ali paused and managed to lift one eyelid just a bit. “Can I hold you? Can I be your big spoon tonight?”

For just a split second, Ashlyn saw Josie’s face where her wife’s should have been and it made her heart skip a beat. The same pure, unvarnished love that a child showed you when they were asking for something was exactly what the keeper had just seen in her wife’s face. It filled her with indescribable emotion as she nodded her head and rolled over onto her right side. She closed her eyes and smiled when she felt Ali take her place behind her, wrapping her arm across her chest and tucking her knees in behind hers. Her shoulder buzzed when she felt the brunette kiss her there and then nuzzle her head into place. In another minute Ashlyn felt the warm puffs of air against the back of her neck that told her Ali was already asleep. She had thought about making a joke about how it should be called queendom instead of kingdom, but changed her mind, letting her wife off the hook. Instead, she closed her own eyes, comforted by the feeling of her love all around her both physically and metaphorically. She snuggled back into Ali and breathed out one last thing.

“Anything you want my love, always.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How about that Pride game yesterday??!! Now that's our team! Ali got her assist! Syd got her first TWO goals in purple!! Ashlyn played lights out and kept Chicago and Kerr to just two goals!!! That was the statement game I was hoping for. But, of course, it was too good to be true and the soccer Gods had to remind us not to get too cocky. I hope Ali's knee is ok. It was hard to see exactly what happened. At first it looked like she was favoring her left knee when Ashlyn came over to check on her and they were both bent over. But then it was definitely her right knee that the trainer was testing and then later icing after she came out of the match. In the Lifetime slo-mo replay it sure looked like her right knee flexed when she blocked the ball (what a great play, by the way!). So it might be a sprained ligament. Who knows? Then the sideline reporter said that it was an aggravation of an existing injury. So maybe she took a knock at some point recently and this just made it worse. She walked off under her own power and was standing without any aid after the game with the rest of her teammates so maybe it's not really serious. Here's hoping. I don't want to think about how bad the defense will be without Kriegs back there. And hopefully they'll give Ali next week off (June 3rd at Seattle) to rest and rehab her knee. Then the Pride have a break and don't play again until June 16th. Maybe she'll be as good as new after that.   
> Aside from that injury, the game was freaking awesome. The Pride scored 8 goals in two games in 4 days. So, um, I think they've unlocked whatever was holding them back in terms of scoring goals. Hopefully they'll keep that rolling and just get better and better as they season continues.


End file.
